Well Traveled

Copyright

Published by Dreamspinner Press 4760 Preston Road Suite 244-149 Frisco, TX 75034 http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/ This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author‟s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. Well Traveled Copyright © 2010 by Margaret Mills and Tedy Ward Cover Art by Catt Ford All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without the written permission of the Publisher, except where permitted by law. To request permission and all other inquiries, contact Dreamspinner Press, 4760 Preston Road, Suite 244-149, Frisco, TX 75034 http://www.dreamspinnerpress.com/ ISBN: 978-1-61581-602-6 Printed in the United States of America First Edition October, 2010 eBook edition available eBook ISBN: 978-1-61581-603-3

Chapter 1

LIVINGSTON, Montana in the summer was hot and windy and green, nestled against a big bend in the Yellowstone River and bustling with the engine of progress. It was altogether a great place to visit, and Gideon Makepeace had been happy to do so. But he‟d heard from the local folk about just how hard Montana winters were—harder than any he‟d ever suffered through in Texas or Florida or Louisiana—so he was just as happy to be headed out today, in plenty of time to avoid one. Mister Landon had been a fair boss, paying him well for his horse skills and treating him with less awe or envy and more respect than most respectable men would treat a fella from a traveling show, but after three months here, butting heads with Landon‟s regular help, and seeing the futility of doing work that those horses‟ asses would as likely undo in weeks, Gideon was happy to be moving on, too. “Gonna miss you, Gideon,” Tommy, one of the youngest of Landon‟s hands, said as he came to stand next to Gideon. “Wish you didn‟t have to go.” Gideon smiled at him, slapping him on the back. At sixteen, Tommy was four years Gideon‟s junior and one of the best hands Landon had. Gideon felt a score of years older than the boy, most days, because he‟d known so much more about horses and life by the time he‟d reached sixteen. “Miss you, too, Tommy. If you decide to leave Livingston, look up the show—we can always use a good horse hand, and I‟ll be glad to put in a word for you with Bill and with my dad.” Gideon‟s daddy ran the horses for Bill Tourney‟s Wild West Show and had since before Gideon had been born, back when Bill still rode broncs and the show numbered no more than two dozen rowdy men

and women. Before Gideon was even old enough to reach a horse‟s withers without a stepstool, he had learned the trade from his pa. Tommy nodded, flushing a little with the compliment. “Thanks, but don‟t expect to see me anytime soon. Mister Landon wants me taking up your work with Boxer—he says he thinks I‟ve learned better than anyone else. That‟s a damned fine horse, Gideon. Always was, but now that we can handle him good….” Gideon smiled, feeling something in him ease a little. Landon clearly wanted the best out of his stock—just not enough to spend his days at the barn himself and keep an eye on the rougher men responsible for keeping his breeding farm running. Landon liked his wealth and his travel, and had only got back from another trip just five days past. The pair of them had spent the last three days talking about two studs Gideon had put most of his time into. Tall roans both of them, the studs were four and five years old, respectively, and while they‟d never be anything like his Star, they weren‟t bad animals at all. Boxer was the five-year-old, and while he was a little bit lazy, he listened to Tommy. Gideon watched the roans now, standing quiet in halter with their ears swiveled toward the noise of people on the street or the steam and clang of the smithy, back behind this livery. Three months ago they‟d have been bucking and rearing, panicked. Gideon cast a measuring eye to their stance and bit his lip as Landon walked toward them, calling out to the horses as if they were people. “Good to know you,” Tommy said, shaking Gideon‟s hand quickly then moving away. “I‟ll remember everything you said.” As he left, Landon walked over, his eyes still on his horses. “They‟re my best studs,” he said, like that was news after all this time. “They‟ve thrown over a dozen healthy foals off my own mares, but better yet, they‟re gonna fetch higher stud fees now when folks cotton to how smart they are.” The old man was probably right about that, Gideon thought with a smile. “I appreciate your work with ‟em, Gideon,” Landon said, and clearly the man did.

“I did my best, sir, but still—don‟t expect ‟em to be like Star, all right? Worse, you let your boys get impatient with ‟em, and they‟ll likely unlearn everything you and me have taught ‟em so far.” Landon laughed and shook his head. “You‟re as sentimental about horseflesh as most men are about their wives,” he said, and Gideon shrugged. The man was right, after all; a great horse could be ruined by a bad trainer, while a mediocre horse with a skilled trainer could surprise the hell out of a man. Gideon secretly thought Landon had the latter in most of his animals, but these two studs were all right. Good lines, good conformation, good lineage—tempers as hot and hard as their pricks, too, he thought with a frown. In the calm, low voice Gideon had taught him to use, Landon spoke to his horses. “Boxer. Square up.” Boxer‟s ears flicked forward, and he lifted his right forefoot, then set it down pretty much where he‟d had it before. “Square up,” Landon repeated. Boxer did a little better, shifting his weight and bringing his right foot into line with his left. “No anger in him either,” Landon said approvingly. “Don‟t know how you schooled that out of him.” “Like I told you, sir, you can cow a horse, or you can respect it.” More quietly, “And I still think your whole investment‟ll be better off if you send Johnson packing.” The man who ran the barn drank too much to make animals trust him. People, too, probably, but then folks could be a lot more gullible than horses. “I‟m thinking on it. Already talked to Tommy about taking over Boxer‟s handling—but I reckon you know that.” There was a smile in the man‟s voice. Gideon tilted his head to look sidelong at his companion. George Landon saw an investment on the hoof in horses, like cattle or hogs. Gideon couldn‟t even say the man was wrong. Landon was the man with the land and the money and the fine studs, after all. Landon had been down in Casper in May, to sell some yearlings and to catch Bill Tourney‟s Traveling Wild West Show. Landon had introduced himself to Robert Makepeace, Gideon‟s pa, with the idea of offering a yearling to the show and increasing his breeding farm‟s

reputation. After the trick riding events, though, the breeder had changed his mind. “Robert,” he‟d said, “I‟d like to hire you to teach my studs some schooling. They‟re already in high demand, but if I can show off how smart they are, too, I‟ll have folks coming from New York and California to get their mares covered.” His daddy had been no more willing to leave the show than Landon would have been to travel with it, but Gideon had loved the idea. “Setting up in somebody‟s nice guest house, sleeping late and bedding down early? Interfering with a local gal for longer than a few days‟ time?” He still remembered the look the elder Makepeace had given him for that one. “You‟d best remember what interfering with local gals can cost you,” his daddy had chastised him. “And more important, what it can cost them. You find better things to do with your time, son.” Gideon had shared the thoughtful silence, certain that his pa wasn‟t hinting at how he himself had been made, but equally sure the man was right. Eventually, he‟d nodded his head. “Yessir. Still, you‟ll put in a word for me, won‟t you? Make sure he knows I‟ve got the grit to tackle the job?” His daddy had grinned. “Yessir. Hell, that kind of money, I almost wish I‟d be willing to part from my horses or my woman and do it myself.” So Gideon had found himself here, enjoying easy work, fresh air, and the tourists who poured through on their way to Yellowstone National Park. He‟d spent his fair share of time trying to charm the birds out of the trees in this bustling city, and mostly avoiding the daddies who‟d want to geld him if they caught him too close to their daughters. Wives were safer. Men could be safer still, at least on the road. Gideon hadn‟t even found a feller really worth looking twice at around here, much less worth the risk of approaching, not when he couldn‟t move on right quick if things fell out wrong. It weren‟t no trouble to take matters in hand, so to speak, not with the private room Landon had given him. And when the need drove him too hard to ignore it, he‟d visited a very nice prostitute on B Street. Thin and

boyish, she‟d been worth every dollar he had paid her, for the more worldly company as much as for the fucks. “You all right with how we settled out, Gideon?” Landon asked, bringing Gideon out of his musings. “About my pay? Yessir.” Landon had an account at the Wells Fargo Bank and had had a letter sent to the branch in San Francisco, opening an account for Gideon into which Landon had deposited nearly all of the $400 Gideon had earned for his summer‟s work. The show would land in San Francisco sometime in September, and Gideon planned to meet it there. “You were right, sir, the best way to lose that money would‟ve been to carry it on me the whole trip.” “Especially since you‟re so determined to hop off and sightsee,” Landon agreed, nodding. One thing Gideon liked about the old man was that as a traveler himself, he seemed to understand the need to see new pieces of the world. Gideon had near five weeks, maybe more if the pickings in California were good for Bill, to get to San Francisco to meet up with Bill Tourney‟s Wild West Show, and he‟d already talked with a Northern Pacific ticket clerk and at length with Doctor MacCray, who had traveled across most of the Rockies in both America and Canada. In his wallet, folded flat and tucked carefully into the breast pocket of his traveling coat, he had the forty dollars he‟d accepted in cash and his train tickets—the one for himself and the one for his horse. Forty dollars was plenty to get him west in comfort. “Yessir,” he said again, and checked his pocket watch. “I‟ve got four more hours, sir. You want help taking these boys back to your spread?” Landon chuckled. “No, no. Boxer here‟s going to the Lazy R, fifteen miles downriver. I want to show him there while he‟s at his best—before my men ruin him again,” he said. Gideon was just glad that humor infused the man‟s voice. “Sorry, don‟t mean to talk so much or so bad about your employees.” Landon waved it away. “You probably aren‟t wrong, Gideon. I never thought much about it before, but to see how well you manage animals that Johnson swears shouldn‟t be handled without a gun and a

bullwhip… well, let‟s just say you‟re making me see things a little more clearly.” Gideon brought up his „aww shucks‟ smile, one he‟d practiced for audiences and pretty women alike. “Right kind of you to say, sir.” Landon turned to him and extended a hand to shake. “I‟m letting Bill and Tommy take Boxer downriver on the flatboat, not Johnson,” he said with a smile. “Reckon even an old dog can learn a few new tricks, eh?” Gideon felt his smile widen, a real one this time, and shook hands firmly with the old man. He‟d already said his goodbyes on Landon‟s stud farm, shaken hands with the other men who he‟d tried to teach the finer points of horse training, pretty sure that most of them wouldn‟t do any damage, but equally sure that few of them boys had the patience or the skill to work a horse past the basics of bending to halter, or cutting and roping. It was what they knew. “Tommy will do you well—and Boxer, too. You take care of yourself, sir,” he said sincerely. “You, too, Gideon.” Gideon stepped back into the shade of a tree and leaned against it, hiding his bare head from the noonday sun, and stuck his hands deep in his pockets as he watched Landon wave Tommy over. He waved again when Landon did and glanced over to the livery corral where Star dozed in the shade of the building. He and his horse were both at a loose end now. He‟d said his goodbyes to Lila at the whorehouse, to Doctor MacCray, to everybody who‟d come to mean anything to him in his long summer here. His bags were packed and held at the train depot, and only his tack, his hat and his horse still wanted collecting. He didn‟t have nothing to do now but get himself a drink, maybe saddle up Star and walk her along the banks of the Yellowstone River before he had to load her onto the train. He didn‟t know how long he‟d lingered, trying to decide how to kill the last of his time here, before a commotion on the other side of the livery caught his attention. Angry voices and a body hitting a wall, it sounded like, got him pushing off the trunk of the tree and moving fast. A couple of months back he might not have gotten involved—

these folks didn‟t take kindly to their Chinese or to their whores showing up in the wrong parts of town, and they didn‟t take kindly to interference either—but he was leaving today, so he could make the effort without much risk. He jogged around the corner of the big livery stable in time to see an Indian try to lever himself up off the ground, and to see a boy who worked at the stable put his foot to the man‟s chest and shove him back down. “Hey!” he yelled. He knew that kid and had thought he was a decent fellow. “What the hell are you doing?” It was clear even from here that the Indian had a problem with his leg; it was bound up and swollen, and when he‟d fallen back down and landed some weight on it, he‟d groaned and curled in on himself. Gideon didn‟t cotton to folks treating animals badly. He sure as hell wasn‟t going to stand by and let them do that to a man who hadn‟t done nothing to them. “We don‟t allow no Injuns in Livingston,” the boy, Jacob, said. Gideon was frankly shocked. He hadn‟t heard Jacob talk this bad even about the China men. “Who made you the boss around here, boy?” he snapped, stepping up and putting himself between Jacob and the man on the ground. He was a little worried about Tom the blacksmith. Tom was a big man, tall and burly and heavily muscled from his work, but Tom looked to be torn between Jacob‟s affront and his own decency. “You two,” he said, pointing to the other two men who‟d joined in the fray. Or started it, maybe. “I‟ve seen you both go into that church right on Callendar Street. That the way God tells you to treat the sick?” “God tells us how to treat heathens,” the bigger of the two, Bart Elston, said, and he spat on the ground near where the Indian lay. “These heathens drink and steal and kill honest, hard-working people.” Gideon resisted the urge to shift his weight to the balls of his feet and narrowed his eyes. He‟d met Bart in a saloon, known the man well enough to say howdy to him on the street, and Bart wasn‟t a man who went out of his way to work hard at anything. “Bart, you don‟t want to waste your energy on foolery like this,” he said with a frown.

“You‟re leaving today, ain‟t you, Gideon?” Tom asked, but his tone wasn‟t as hard as Bart‟s. “Why don‟t you just go on along and let us handle this?” He met Gideon‟s eyes, and even though he wasn‟t carrying the hatred Bart seemed to, Gideon saw the set of his shoulders and his jaw. Gideon couldn‟t take them on. Four of them, and at least three of them angry—that was a loser for sure. But he couldn‟t leave the Indian alone either; he had too many Indian friends to walk away from this stranger now. There was no denying that there was anger and even hate between many whites and redskins, but most of the Indians he knew were as good and decent as the best white man. His back was to the man on the ground, but he‟d gotten a good look before he‟d stepped past him: he was a small man, slender, with long black hair hanging loose around his face, and eyes that weren‟t the color a full-blooded Indian should have. Gideon relaxed his stance a little and stuck his hands into his pants pockets. “He ain‟t all Indian,” he said. “Maybe the white half of his soul ain‟t worth beating on just for the Indian half.” Bart Elston and his friend stiffened further, and Gideon felt his jaw tighten. No doubt they were thinking the worst on how a half-breed might have got made. But Tom looked hesitant about the idea of white blood on his hands, so Gideon figured he had a winning argument here. “I will go,” a faint voice called from behind him, the words almost too soft to hear. Elston took a step forward. “Get on out of here, Injun—before we take you out of town ourselves.” Gideon heard movement behind him, the rustle of hide clothes, the scraping of sand and rock as the Indian moved, trying to get to his feet. He was breathing hard, too hard. He needed a doctor bad enough that he‟d come into Livingston alone to look for one. “I‟ll help him,” Gideon said, taking a step back but still facing Tom. Tom was the closest he had to an ally here. He‟d cowed Jacob, but Elston and his friend could stir the kid up again, quick. “I‟m leaving anyway—may as well let him go with me.”

“Could just string him up,” Elston said, smiling in a way that made Gideon‟s blood run hot with anger. Without thinking, his hand drifted toward his revolver, but before it made contact, Tom spoke up. “For what, Bart? Falling down?” “He might have been eying the horses,” Elston said, his suspicion exactly the kind that someone who wanted to would believe. Tom turned sideways now, standing between Gideon and Elston. “He wasn‟t,” he said, a hard edge to his voice that relieved Gideon greatly and restored his faith in the man. More quietly Tom said, “No need in wasting good rope or good time,” and maybe he was glad of any excuse to avoid a hanging. Tom glanced back at Gideon. “Get him out of town.” His words weren‟t hate-filled, but his tone left no room for argument—either from Gideon or from the other men around them. He was the man in charge here, and when he turned around and walked back into the livery, Gideon felt the tension ease. He took another step back toward the Indian, glancing over his shoulder to find the man leaning heavily against the wall of the stable. He was trying to put weight on the leg that was injured, and Gideon saw the sheen of sweat on his skin and the lines of pain cut deep into his strong features. “Hey,” he said, pitching his voice low and slowly turning to where he could see the other man. “Let me give you a hand.” He reached out, intending to catch the Indian by the upper arm. But the man jerked back and away, stumbling and almost falling before he caught his balance. “No, thank you,” the Indian said stiffly, even though it was clear that he needed the help. Fever, Gideon could tell from the sweat and the brightness of his eyes. “What happened?” he asked, waving toward the man‟s leg even as he glanced back to find Elston and Jacob staring at them, waiting. Elston‟s friend had already faded away, probably to the sheriff‟s office to find some legal backing for his hate.

But the Indian either didn‟t hear him or ignored him, his attention on trying to stand up well enough to walk away. He was still using the barn for balance but moving slowly toward the road. He had bandaged the wound, but Gideon could see blood and pus staining the cloth. “Hey,” he said, moving closer without trying to touch him this time, “I‟m trying to help you.” It was about then that the Indian ran out of barn wall to lean on and started hobbling. On the third step, his bad leg gave way, and it was only Gideon‟s quick save that kept him from landing in the dirt again. “Come on,” he said, catching the man by the waist and taking his weight. It wasn‟t much, compared to many; he was slimmer than he looked, the buckskin clothes disguising his slightness, and Gideon had no trouble pulling the man upright and hauling him out of the livery yard and away. Definitely a fever, the Indian‟s body was hot where it touched Gideon‟s, and this close, Gideon could smell the infection. He led him down the road, ignoring the looks that strangers threw in their direction. The Indian didn‟t put up a fight, and Gideon could feel the man‟s will giving way. When they reached the alley between the general store and the hardware store, he guided the Indian into it, looking back to make sure they weren‟t being followed. “You came to town for the doctor?” he asked, pushing the guy back toward a bunch of empty wooden crates that were stacked against the hardware store‟s wall. “It does not matter,” the Indian panted. “It was a mistake—” “You need to see one,” Gideon said, putting a hand on a thin shoulder and pressing. “Sit down—dammit, sit down.” The Indian sat with a grunt of pain, and Gideon dropped down onto one knee beside him, trying to get a better look at the wound. “What happened?” he asked again, carefully touching the bandaging on the man‟s leg. It was clearly swollen, and heat fairly radiated off it. The man jerked and hissed, but he didn‟t pull free of Gideon‟s touch. When he spoke, his voice was low and flat. “Wild pigs,” he said. “They came in the night, a family of them. I woke to find them near my camp, and when I tried to leave, the boar attacked.”

Gideon winced, recalling tales he‟d heard about the dangers of wild pigs. If you came upon one without a gun, the best you could do was get out of the way or get stuck like this man had. “Lucky to be alive,” he said. “But you won‟t be much longer if you don‟t get a doctor to look at it, maybe drain it.” “I must leave,” the Indian said, “or those men will kill me faster than the wound will.” He pushed up, trying to stand. “Thank you for your help.” Gideon just stood and waited for him to fall back down, which didn‟t take but a second. “Just hold on a minute,” he urged and settled the man back on the crate. “Let me think about this.” The Indian bent over, his hands around his waist and his hair hanging forward to cover his face. He was sick, truly sick, and he knew it. “Did you know what kind of welcome you were likely to get here?” he asked. That got the man‟s head up, and a faint, faint smile touched his mouth. “You did not?” Gideon scowled. So the guy wouldn‟t have come into this city if he thought he had any other choice. Plenty didn‟t mind the natives anymore, but plenty more did. Gideon hadn‟t never been to Montana before this trip, but he knew there were reservations out here. Maybe the natives were just too close. Gideon had more than a passing acquaintance with Doctor Holt MacCray. He was a fine doctor, a good businessman, and a lousy gambler. Gideon knew that for the right price, the man would treat anyone. “You got any money?” he asked the Indian. The man raised his head, and for the first time, he looked Gideon square in the face. His eyes were blue all right, not dark as the night at the witching hour, but the deep blue of a clear mountain lake on a cloudy day. He had white blood in him, near.

“If you plan to steal from me, then just kill me now.” The words were flat, but there was weariness in them that made Gideon‟s belly knot up. He shook his head, protective of this defeated stranger and amused by his own soft heart. “It ain‟t for me,” he said kindly. “There‟s a doctor in town who will see you, long as you can pay.” The Indian held his gaze for several long seconds, and Gideon had the sense that he was being measured. Then, with a sigh, the man reached into his shirt and drew out a small leather bag held by a braided leather cord. He pulled it over his head and opened it with shaking hands, emptying the contents into one palm. Four dollars or more in mixed coins, Gideon saw. Not much, but plenty to get Doctor MacCray‟s attention. The Indian stared at the coins as if they were treasure—and maybe they were. But he said nothing as he held them out to Gideon. “I will repay you for your help,” he said softly. “But if you plan to take this and leave me, please, kill me. Do not leave me to suffer here.” Gideon took his hand, fine-boned and strong, holding it even after he had taken the coins. “I‟m taking you with me,” he said. “You can see where the money‟s going.” The Indian stared at him, frowning. “They said I must leave town,” he said, and Gideon realized that the man was only now beginning to accept that Gideon had no plans to rob him. “They said—” “Folks say a lotta things I don‟t pay any mind. You let me worry about them,” he said with more confidence than he felt. “Right now, we need to get you to a doctor, get that leg taken care of.” He waited until the dark blue eyes met his again, then, when the Indian gave a slight nod, he used the hand he was still holding to help the man back to his feet. “That way,” he said, pointing with this chin to the back of the alleyway. No use inviting trouble. “We can cut across to Second Street with no one the wiser.” The Indian had grit, Gideon had to give him that; even though he was weak and couldn‟t put much weight on his hurt leg at all, he kept his mouth shut and his head down, and held on tight round Gideon‟s shoulder. Maybe they‟d just look like a couple of drunks to the people

they passed. “What‟s your name, anyway?” he asked as they crossed Callendar Street. “Jedediah….” The Indian took a harsh breath. “Jedediah.” “Well, Jedediah Jedediah,” he smiled, “we‟re almost there. Doctor MacCray is a good friend of mine, and I‟m sure he‟s gonna fix you up, right as rain.” The Indian—Jedediah, now that he had a name, and one Gideon found he liked—let out a harsh, if quiet laugh. “You are… very optimistic.” Gideon felt his smile broaden, as much at the compliment as at the words the man was using. “Well, yes, you might say I am.” As they neared MacCray‟s office on Main Street, Gideon stayed to the shadows, sheltering the Indian as much as he could. MacCray kept his clinic rooms on the street level of a two-story building, and he lived in the rooms above. The clinic held regular hours, but that didn‟t always mean that the doctor was in. He had an assistant who stayed most days, handling the things he could, fetching and carrying and learning the trade, and allowing MacCray to come and go as he pleased. Gideon looked around as they drew near. A narrow stretch of dirt sat between Doctor MacCray‟s building and the next closest one on the right, and in that space, someone had a garden growing—mostly wildflowers and an apple tree, things that could grow untended. There were also some benches in the shade, near a water stand that the birds liked to play in, and it was to one of these that he led Jedediah. “Best let me see if the Doc‟s alone—no sense causing us trouble if he‟s got a room full of people waiting.” Jedediah didn‟t argue, settling with a low hiss onto one of the benches. Gideon had picked it intentionally. It was against the building and sheltered by a range of plants and tall flowers, so that the Indian would be mostly hidden from view. But before he turned to go inside, Gideon took Jed‟s hand and pressed the bag of coins into it. “You hold on to this until I get back,” he said, pleased when Jedediah blinked in surprise.

As it happened there was only one woman in the receiving room when Gideon walked in, and she was leaving. He took off his hat and waited patiently as she finished up with Elmer, MacCray‟s young apprentice, and he even smiled and nodded to her, opening the door for her to pass through so that he was alone with Elmer. “Gideon,” Elmer said with the friendly smile he used on everybody who passed through that door. “I thought you were leaving town.” “Well, I ran into someone who needs some help,” he said, smiling at the man. “Doc MacCray around?” Before Elmer could answer, a door from the back of the building opened, and the man in question appeared, pulling on his coat, his hat already on his head. “Gideon!” he called out as he drew near. Doctor Holt MacCray couldn‟t be a day under sixty, but he still had a spring in his step and plenty of strength in that thick body. “Thought you‟d be on your way west by now, son.” “Not just yet,” Gideon answered. “I ran into a friend who needs a little help—can I bother you for a minute or two?” MacCray frowned, his gray eyes sweeping around the receiving room. “Your friend invisible?” Gideon chuckled, more to show his good nature and humor the man. “Nah, he‟s just waiting outside.” Gideon chatted idly about a poker game they‟d been involved in three nights ago as they left the building. MacCray was jovial enough, but he looked at his watch enough times in their short walk to tell Gideon he was distracted. That might be good. As they rounded the corner of the building and moved into the garden area, MacCray slowed and frowned. When he saw Jedediah, he stopped. “This is your friend?” he asked, interrupting Gideon in midsentence. Gideon glanced to Jedediah who was hunched over but had his head tilted sideways, looking up at them with his hair pulled to one side to show his face. In the shade of the plants, his eyes were dark, still not the color you‟d expect to see on an Indian, but closer. He watched the doctor, but he didn‟t move, and Gideon guessed that it was taking a lot

of courage on his part to stay still and exposed this way. Or a lot of desperation. “Wild boar got him,” he said over his shoulder to MacCray. “In the leg.” MacCray didn‟t move, but Gideon looked back to see his eyes looking down to the bandage around Jed‟s left leg. “I think it‟s pretty bad,” Gideon went on, keeping his voice even. “He can‟t hardly put weight on it, and I don‟t reckon he‟d have come into town if it weren‟t. Bart Elston tried to run him off, and him with only one good leg to run with.” MacCray looked back up at Jed‟s face and his frown grew. He glanced around them and took a step back, as if expecting trouble. Gideon straightened and turned to face the man. He pitched his words low, just for MacCray. “We‟ll pay you, whatever it takes. It‟s bad, and it ain‟t gonna get better without help.” MacCray‟s face tightened, but Gideon saw the flicker of uncertainty. He was, at heart, a good man. Gideon had seen the little signs: the way he went into the poorer parts of town from time to time, to visit the homes of people who wouldn‟t come to see him and couldn‟t afford him, the way he visited the working girls during the day—not to sample their wares, even though some would have let him, but to help them with the kinds of problems they couldn‟t very well come to see him about. “Just take a look, Doc,” Gideon said, reaching into the pocket of his work pants. He pulled out a Liberty half-eagle that he‟d had every intention of saving in case of emergency, and held it out. “You can tell people he paid you in gold.” MacCray took the coin, shaking his head but the corners of his lips turned up. “This looks familiar—didn‟t I see this just the other night?” He tossed it up in the air and caught it before slipping it into the pocket of his vest, where it had been three nights past before he‟d lost a big pot to Gideon. This had been the first real money Gideon had won here in Livingston, as he played more for company than for the sport of it. Accordingly, he was no more than passing decent at the cards.

Gideon flashed a smile, as amused as he was relieved. MacCray was still wary, though. Before he‟d look at Jed, he moved them further into the garden, toward the back of the building. “More private,” he said, and it was. They seated Jed on another bench, this one lower so that it was easier for him to stretch out his leg. He‟d already carefully cut the stitching up the leg of his pants all the way to the knee, so MacCray had easy access to the bandage. As he unwound it, the smell of infection grew stronger and Jedediah‟s fingers tightened their grip on the edge of the bench, making the tendons in his hands stand out. The inner layers of the bandage were stuck together and to the leg itself, the cloth discolored and thick with blood and yellow pus. Gideon had seen enough injuries on horses and men to know what it meant. Even if MacCray could treat it, it was still going to be rough. It was a damned wonder the Indian had been able to stand, much less walk. “Gideon, go and tell Elmer I need a pan of clean water. And have him unlock the back door.” “Yessir.” Gideon took off at a jog, and waited impatiently as Elmer took down an enamel bowl and filled it from a cistern in the corner. “What‟s it for, Gideon?” Elmer asked, genial enough, but Gideon could almost see his ears swiveling, looking for gossip. “Reckon the Doc‟ll tell you as soon as he‟s ready for you to know,” Gideon replied, took the pan, and eased back outside. He held it while the doctor used a cleaner piece of the bandage to soak those parts stuck to Jedediah, who hissed as MacCray carefully worked the last layers of bandage away from the flesh. “Pretty bad,” MacCray said, more to himself than to them. He turned Jedediah‟s leg so he could see the wound from different angles, then he used the balled-up bandage to swipe at places. Jedediah caught his breath, and his eyes closed tightly. Gideon saw the beads of sweat pop out on his forehead and upper lip as MacCray continued to probe the wounds. “Bad infection,” he said, more loudly. “Best thing to do is stop if before it spreads—cut it off. Could do it today—”

But as he drew the tip of one finger across Jed‟s leg, above the wound but below the knee, Jed jerked back and twisted away, practically throwing himself to the ground and away from MacCray. “No,” he said as he scrabbled away from them, “no cutting. No cutting!” “Hey, now,” Gideon called, moving around MacCray without drawing too close to Jedediah, “hold on now, let‟s talk about this for a—” “No cutting,” the Indian repeated firmly. “It would be better to die quickly, less pain—” “Calm down,” Gideon said, holding out both hands as he dropped into a crouch close to the Indian. “Nobody‟s talking about dying. Nothing‟s been decided. Take a breath.” He nodded, trying to be reassuring. “It‟ll be all right.” “No, it won‟t,” MacCray said, his voice grim. He had risen to his feet, shaking his legs as if his knees were hurting him. “It‟s a serious situation you‟ve got there, and there are only so many ways for it to go. An infection that bad, well, it‟s rare to live through it if it spreads through your whole body.” Jedediah shook his head and pulled further away, getting his good leg up under him. “I‟ll die for sure if I lose it,” he said, glaring at MacCray. “It‟s hard enough to survive with two good legs around your kind.” “Slow down,” Gideon said, annoyed now, but with MacCray more than with the Indian. He‟d thought the man had some sympathy in him. “Let‟s talk about this—” “You speak pretty well,” MacCray said, talking over Gideon. “You grow up living with „our kind‟?” He was standing still now, his head tilted to one side as he watched Jedediah. The brim of his hat cast a shadow over his eyes, but Gideon knew his expressions well enough to see that he wasn‟t hostile or angry—if anything, he was curious. Jedediah looked at him, his eyes flashing. He was shaking, holding himself up but just barely, and Gideon had to stop himself from

reaching out to help. But the Indian‟s voice was ice cold as he replied, “Not by my choice or the choice of my people.” MacCray stared for another few seconds, watching as Jedediah finally rolled to one side, breathing heavily as he rested on his hip and arms, half-sitting, his bad leg resting on his good one. When Jedediah drew a deep breath, as if to get up, MacCray said, “There‟s another way. With infection like that, I can‟t promise it‟ll work at all, but if gangrene hasn‟t set in….” He sighed. “It‟ll take time and a lot more work, too.” He turned to Gideon. “He‟ll have to stay somewhere where I can see him two or three times a day—but not here, not at my place.” Gideon turned on him. “What the hell kind of doctor are you?” he started, but MacCray waved a hand in his direction. “Oh, shut up, Gideon. I‟m saying, he stays here and folks‟ll hear about it. They‟ll hold it against him. I could give two hoots about what they want to think of me, and you know it.” Here he smiled, shrewd, and his eyes moved briefly back to Jedediah. “When they‟re sick enough, they‟ll come running my way. But somebody like Bart Elston‟ll want to cause an Indian trouble just because he presumed. So check around, see if we can find him a room down on South B. All right?” Gideon blinked, looked from him back to Jedediah. Darned if MacCray wasn‟t right about that. “I could ask Lila. Lila Dumont,” he explained, as much for Jedediah as for MacCray. “I‟ve stayed over there a time or two. They‟ve got a room in back for a Mexican boy who took care of three of the whorehouses, ran errands and the like. They lost him two weeks back, haven‟t replaced him yet.” “Even better,” MacCray agreed. “I‟ve got reasons to go there, reasons nobody has the balls to question.” Almost to himself he added, “Josephine‟s big heart will be her undoing one day. But not today.” Louder he said, “Help me get him inside—through the back. I‟ve got to clean that leg up.” When Jedediah started shaking his head, he laughed, low. “It might hurt like I‟ve cut it off, but I won‟t. I want to see how this works.” Jed rolled over to sit on his butt, pulling his bad leg up. “Why?” he asked. “Why would you do this?”

MacCray frowned at him, bushy eyebrows drawing together. “Son, why the hell wouldn‟t I?” Jedediah blinked at that and looked toward Gideon, and Gideon had to admit, he liked already that this familiar fellow trusted him. But he had to shrug in reply, because Holt MacCray liked being an enigma—fancy dressed and schooled in the east, associates he corresponded with all the way over in Europe, and as like to swear and spit in public as he was to help a whore or an old crone cross a muddy street. “Don‟t ask me,” he said with a shrug. Jedediah frowned. “You are the one who brought me here. Who else should I ask?” That got MacCray‟s thick eyebrows rising and forced a bark of a laugh from the old man. “I think he‟s got you there, Gideon,” he chuckled. “You told Elmer to unlock the back?” “Yessir, I did,” Gideon said, grateful—for the help and for the distraction, because how was he supposed to answer a question like that? MacCray frowned toward the side of his building. “Elmer‟s probably trying to peek out the windows right now and catch a glimpse of something. I‟ll send him off to tell my two o‟clock that I‟ve had to reschedule. You get this man inside.” MacCray emptied the pan of water on the wildflowers, gathered up the dirty bandages, and headed back to the front of his office. “Come on, Jedediah.” Gideon moved closer, intending to help the Indian rise, but Jedediah drew more closely in on himself. “The money I gave you, it is all I have,” he said, looking up at Gideon. “I cannot pay for a room here. I left my pack out of town—I will go there—” “Hush, now,” Gideon said. “We‟ll figure something out. You let me worry on that for now, and you worry on getting better.” “Why are you helping me?” Jedediah asked. “Your doctor wants money—and I will pay him.” „If I live‟ hung in the air between them. “What will I have to do to repay you?”

Gideon shrugged. “I got Indian friends, real good people,” he said honestly, “and I don‟t have any trouble with them. Most of them are more decent than plenty of white folks I‟ve come up against. They‟d help a stranger out if he needed helping and didn‟t have a kind soul about to lend ‟em a hand. No more fussing, now. Let‟s get you inside.” This time, Jedediah didn‟t argue when Gideon moved to help him to his feet. It didn‟t take as much effort as Gideon had expected to get him standing, now that he was cooperating nicely, and by the time they got to the back door, MacCray was standing there with it open, looking impatient. “Best get this done,” he said, stepping aside for them to enter his private office. “Through the doors and into the side room,” he said, pointing. He‟d already taken his jacket off and rolled up his sleeves, and he was carrying an armful of bottles and tools that Gideon didn‟t want to think on overmuch. He‟d broken his leg when he was a kid, and that had hurt plenty. This… he knew just by looking how much worse this was. Jedediah sidled into the examining room, using the wall for support, and went where MacCray directed him, finally hopping across the floor and parking his narrow butt up on the end of the metal bed. “Help him get those pants off, Gideon,” MacCray ordered, and Gideon swallowed before stepping forward. “I can do it,” Jedediah started, so Gideon shrugged and watched him try, watched him work the leather laces on his buckskin pants, watched him stand on his good leg to ease them over his hips. The skin under the leather was almost as dark as the skin of his hands, all smooth and supple-looking, and his parts were covered by a leather undergarment Gideon had seen on plenty of Indians in Bill Tourney‟s show. The garment was spare, a triangle of a pouch that narrowed to a strap between his legs, and Gideon grit his teeth as he knelt down on one knee, trying to keep his hands from interfering with Jedediah‟s as he helped the man tug the pants on down. He hadn‟t seen this much bare skin since before he‟d left the show. He was as careful as he could be, working the loosened leg over the injury, but Jedediah still hissed in pain and hopped back on the

table so Gideon could get the one leather boot and trousers off Jedediah‟s good leg. He stepped back fast, placing the pile of buckskin near the head of the bed, and retreated to the wall by the door, covertly watching the Indian. Jedediah looked wary, he looked brave, and he looked good, slim, and strong… and Gideon turned his eyes away, looking for something else to stare at that might be even half as interesting. He might have unnatural interests, but he wasn‟t so low as to ogle a man who was sick and helpless. “Now here‟s what I‟m gonna do,” MacCray said, just like he always did. The man was a great doctor for that, in Gideon‟s opinion, never trying to hide nothing from his patient or gloss over the rough spots. “I‟m gonna clean out that wound, first with carbolic and then with a cloth and brush, maybe with a tool or two if there‟s something that can clearly be helped by scraping. Then I‟m gonna clean it again, kill all the infection we can see. After, we‟ll put a poultice on it to help drain the mess up inside the meat, and I‟ll wrap it back up in clean bandages. Then we‟ll see.” He paused and looked around, then headed purposely toward the cabinets along one wall. “I‟ve got some laudanum for you.” “I do not—” Jedediah started. MacCray cut him off with the same annoyed wave he‟d used on Gideon—that he used on most people. “Yes, you do.” He administered a tiny draught of the laudanum and sat back for a minute, watching. Gideon folded his arms across his chest and did the same, wondering what they were watching for. Well, he knew why he was watching, and the knowledge made him feel more than a little guilty. The Indian was unquestionably in pain and just as clearly in need of a friend. Gideon would have been that just because of the trouble Bart Elston had made. The fact that Jedediah was strong and fine-boned, with all that pretty hair and sober countenance, just made the doing easier, was all. “Good,” MacCray said after a couple of minutes. Gideon blinked; nothing had happened, as far as he could see. But MacCray knew more than Gideon did, because he stepped up and poured more laudanum into a spoon, and bade Jedediah take it, too. “All right.” He pulled a

tray forward and started organizing bottles and jars, clean cloths, and fresh water. “Gideon, why don‟t you go on down and see if you can arrange a room for him? There‟s nothing here you‟ll want to see.” Gideon wasn‟t squeamish. He‟d helped deliver foals and tended sick horses, cattle, dogs, and people for most of his life with the traveling show. But he figured Jedediah wouldn‟t want a witness, because there was no way this wouldn‟t hurt him like hell, laudanum or no laudanum. “All right.” Jedediah‟s eyes tracked him to the door, which gave Gideon pause. “I‟ll be back. One way or the other, I‟ll be back in under an hour, and let you know what I‟ve fixed up for you.” Jedediah said nothing, but something in his face eased. MacCray pretty much ignored him, already focused on his operation. Gideon let himself out the door.

Chapter 2

THE walk to Lila‟s house wasn‟t far, just a few blocks on this sunny day, but Gideon felt himself awash with frustration. That Indian was going to die just to save his leg, and there seemed no point in that. But maybe he wouldn‟t. MacCray would have said if there was no hope, and offered a bottle for the pain, maybe sat vigil. He wouldn‟t put himself or the Indian out for no reason at all. And not for that halfeagle, either. His spirits bolstered a bit, he reached Lila‟s and let himself in through the front door. The sitting room was empty, but that wasn‟t uncommon. With the passenger trains going through today, travelers would be here getting their urges met before they had to leave, so Lila and the others would be occupied. He sat down in a wingback chair and pulled a magazine off the end table, turning the pages absently and looking at photographs of the national park not far south. It was what brought the tourists through Livingston, though Gideon hadn‟t made the trip himself. Too expensive, and the tour took three days he hadn‟t had whilst he was working. A noise in the back hall brought his head up, but it wasn‟t Lila. Josephine Howard, the house‟s madame, strolled up the hall and into the room, welcoming him with a smile. “Gideon Makepeace, I didn‟t think we‟d be seeing you again! Lila‟s currently entertaining,” she started, “but—” “Thank you kindly, Miz Howard,” he cut in, “but I ain‟t looking for company today.”

Miz Howard dropped her ample frame into a chair across from him. “Then what can we do you for?” “I….” He paused, realizing just what he was doing. “It looks like I might be staying in town for a few more days,” he said. “I wondered if I might rent that back room for me and a friend, seeing as it‟s empty right now?” She shrugged. “I suppose we could save you a little money over a boarding house room,” she offered. “It‟s not just that, Miz Howard. The friend is hurt bad, and Doc MacCray‟s looking at him right now—he got gored by a wild pig, and his leg‟s infected.” Miz Howard frowned at him. “So why isn‟t he staying at the doctor‟s office? MacCray‟s got sick rooms.” Gideon glanced around to make sure no gentleman callers were within earshot—locals frequented this house, too, after all—and lowered his voice. “He‟s an Indian, ma‟am. Doc MacCray don‟t think it‟d be safe for him to be seen reaching above his station like that.” Miz Howard‟s face darkened by degrees. “And he thinks it‟d be safe for us, putting an Injun up?” Gideon leaned forward, earnest now. “I reckon that‟s for you to decide. I know you kept a Mexican here, and there weren‟t no trouble. Lila said you‟d actually kept a Chinese boy here for a time, and nobody gave you problems about him either.” “No problems we couldn‟t manage,” Miz Howard said slowly. “But Gideon, they were employees. And we did have to pay off the cops to leave ‟em alone, especially the Chinese boy. But we‟ve got no reason,” she said, talking herself out of any offer. “No reason to justify keeping an Injun here. I‟m sorry, but even your pretty face isn‟t enough.” Gideon snorted and tilted his head just so. He wasn‟t particularly vain about his looks, but he knew he had them. He‟d gotten the best parts of both his parents, and he knew it—in dirty blond hair that curled a little when he didn‟t tame it, in a long, lean frame honed from hard work, and in his mother‟s eyes.

Miz Howard glared at him. “Don‟t you go batting those blue eyes at me, mister. I‟ve seen ‟em all. I won‟t put my girls in danger. Couple of ‟em won‟t appreciate having a redskin on the property, anyway.” Gideon offered his most charming smile. “You telling me you can‟t handle your gals?” Miz Howard frowned. “I‟m telling you it ain‟t worth it for no benefit, Gideon. I‟m sorry.” “I don‟t want you to be sorry, ma‟am, I want you to help out a good customer and a hurt stranger—and Doc MacCray—for good pay. I‟ve got money. You just need to tell me what I‟ll owe you for your trouble.” He sighed and just put the truth all out there. “You know even if a boarding house would keep us, the locals‟d get wind of it and try to run him out of town. He can‟t walk. He‟s that bad off.” She chewed on her full bottom lip, thinking. “There‟s no guarantee folks won‟t try and run him off this place, too,” she said slowly. Gideon waved a hand. “The men won‟t cause you trouble for fear you‟ll reject ‟em when they come calling to satisfy their own needs.” He knew that much about the whoring business, and he‟d seen Miz Howard turn away fellas who‟d got too rowdy or who‟d tried to cause trouble for her girls up on Callendar Street, then slinked back here expecting their treats like nothing was changed. “The cops‟ll shut ‟em down even if they do try, because you already pay to keep ‟em out of your business.” “My whoring business, Gideon,” she said, but he knew already that she was giving in. So did she. Gideon looked down to hide his grin. “Doc MacCray thought it was a good idea,” he said, being delicate about the fact that she and the doctor had regular trysts. “MacCray doesn‟t run this house,” she said firmly, but then she sighed. “If I have to pay the cops extra, it won‟t be coming out of my pocket.” “No, ma‟am,” Gideon agreed. Transaction settled. All they needed to do now was iron out the details.

“You know it‟s no never mind to me what color a man‟s skin is—” she started, airy and sophisticated, and Gideon snorted loud enough to cause her to glare at him. “All right, fine,” she snapped, irritated. “The redskins… too many of ‟em like their liquor too much. And they smell funny.” She was right, about the smell at least. Indians did smell different—not funny, but woodsy and wild, and not at all like a sweaty white man or one who‟d washed with lye soap or used the perfumed waters and powders most city folks did. “This Indian just smells sick, ma‟am.” She frowned at him. “I expect we can keep him hid from the law for a bit, but the minute they start asking for their share, you or your Indian friend will be paying it.” Gideon nodded. He had forty dollars. Jedediah had four. Surely that would see this through, one way or the other.

“HE‟S got grit,” Holt MacCray announced when Gideon eased back into the office. “Barely made a sound while I cleaned that wound out— but he didn‟t turn me down on the third dose of laudanum either.” MacCray grinned as he rolled down the sleeves of his shirt and buttoned the cuffs. He‟d tossed his apron to one side but not before Gideon saw the splotches of red and yellow. The room smelled of sickness, carbolic and other chemicals that Gideon couldn‟t put a name to, and under it, the bitterness of infection and the copper tang of blood. Jedediah lay stretched out on the room‟s long table, one arm over his eyes, the other one at his side. His injured leg was bent at the knee and raised up by a pillow, and Gideon looked at the clean bandage wrapped around it, the white of the cloth stark against the dark of Jedediah‟s brown skin. “He needs to stay off that leg,” MacCray went on. “Which won‟t be a problem for a while, as I doubt he can carry any weight on it right now. I cleaned it out as best I could, and soaked the bandage in carbolic too for good measure—read about a boy whose leg healed up fine by

keeping it wrapped in carbolic-soaked bandages, but that‟s just an article in a medical journal.” He frowned, thoughtful, his bushy eyebrows drawing down. “We‟re going to have to keep a close watch on it.” He pointed to three bottles on the counter near the door. “There‟s more carbolic and some rubbing alcohol—I‟ll want to check the wound again tonight, probably wash it out again. I‟ll come by again in the morning. The third bottle‟s laudanum, use it when you clean the wound—it‟ll hurt like a son of a bitch, but he knows that already.” MacCray walked to the counter and picked up a small bottle of white powder, holding it out to Gideon. “There‟s something else, too. Got this from a friend back East. It‟s called salicylic acid, and if it doesn‟t bother his stomach too much, ought to help his pain. I haven‟t tried it much, but I reckon your friend here is as good a place to start as any.” Gideon took the bottle and studied it. “Sally—sali—what?” Gideon asked, eying it warily. It reminded him too much of the coca he‟d seen some folks use that made ‟em high and twitchy. “It‟s distilled from willow bark,” MacCray said, impatient now. “White willow bark?” Jedediah asked from his bed, which got MacCray‟s attention even faster than Gideon‟s. “Yes.” “My people use that. We make tea from it, for aches in the joints.” MacCray cast Gideon a superior look. “See? If it‟s good for arthritis pain, it‟ll be good for his.” Gideon palmed the bottle, mollified. “What do I do? Mix it with water? Like a tincture?” MacCray nodded. “Just like, but not with the alcohol,” he agreed. “Half a teaspoon or so in warm water. If it works as well as I‟ve heard, it should ease the pain and help with the fever. Did Josephine give in?” “Yeah,” he answered. “Back room at her house.” MacCray smiled. “Good. I visit there regularly enough. It won‟t look out of the way for me to drop by.” He looked over Gideon‟s

shoulder to where Jedediah was trying to sit up on the table. He was weak and wobbly, and his eyes were wide and unfocused. Gideon didn‟t know if it was laudanum or fever. Gideon walked to the table in time to keep Jedediah from falling off it. Instead, the Indian fell against him, and his long hair spilled across the back of Gideon‟s hand, soft and smelling woodsy. How Miz Howard could think this was a bad smell was beyond Gideon. “Let‟s get you out of here,” he whispered, helping Jedediah first into his pants, then off the table, and holding him up when his knees buckled. “Good thing you‟re not heavy.” “Keep him away from strong drink,” MacCray said as he picked up his coat. “No, no alco… no,” Jedediah said, trying to form the words even as he swayed drunkenly in Gideon‟s hold. “No,” Gideon agreed, laughing. “Let‟s get you to bed.” MacCray led them out the back, promising to stop by that night. It was only seven blocks to the whorehouse, but Gideon came close to fetching Star and giving this man a lift. He was wobblier than a new colt, from pain or drugs or plain old exhaustion, at this point. But now that MacCray had locked up his office, Gideon couldn‟t conscience leaving Jedediah somewhere alone, not all vulnerable like this. “You up for a stroll? It‟s not far,” he said. “I am.” Jedediah shook his head, and blinked his eyes against the afternoon sun. “I feel drunk.” “That‟ll be the laudanum,” Gideon agreed. “It‟ll help you sleep, once we get you abed. And it‟s got to be cutting that pain some.” Jedediah nodded. “Yes.” “All right. Take it easy now,” Gideon ordered softly, wrapping Jedediah‟s arm around his shoulder and doing what he could to keep any weight off the injured leg. Jedediah carried more of his own weight than he probably should have, but it made getting through the streets easy enough. In this part of town, most of the people they met were tourists with their own agendas, men and women who didn‟t pay much

attention to Gideon or the slight figure hobbling along beside him. Jedediah paid more attention to walking than to any of the passersby. They went down an alley off Lewis Street, snuck along behind the Baptist church until they hit Clark Street, and turned onto B a block north of the whorehouse. “Almost there,” Gideon promised, because a sweat had broken out on Jedediah just from this short walk. Taking the little path between two buildings, they entered through the back of the house, as Miz Howard had asked Gideon to do. Jedediah gave no resistance until they were halfway into the back hallway, then he stopped abruptly, pulling away from Gideon. “This—it‟s a—there are women here,” he said, but his words were slurred enough that it took Gideon a second to understand him. When he did, he frowned. “You don‟t like women?” The very idea of it was strange to him. “Dangerous,” Jedediah mumbled, looking around. “Get a man killed.” Gideon smiled. “That, they can,” he agreed. “But not today. Besides, I don‟t reckon you‟ll be up for the dangers they offer. Not for a while. Come on, let‟s get to the room.” Jedediah frowned, but he offered no resistance as Gideon led him into the little room in the back corner of the house. Miz Howard had left linens, so Gideon sat Jedediah in the room‟s straight-backed chair and made up the bed, talking to ease things along. “I know a gal here, got to know her pretty good out of bed, too— she plays backgammon like you wouldn‟t believe. But the lady who runs this place, Josephine Howard, she‟s the one I made the deal with. You‟ll get to stay here until you get better, and I‟ll make up a pallet on the floor, help look after you between doctor‟s visits.” Jedediah blinked some more and looked around the little room. “This and your doctor… this is not four dollars and sixty-seven cents.” “No,” Gideon agreed genially. “But I‟ve got money, and when you get better, you can figure out how to pay me back.” Jedediah‟s lips turned up in a pained, if real, smile. “Optimist,” he said again.

Gideon grinned. “Come on,” he said once he‟d got the bed made to his satisfaction, “let‟s get you horizontal.” Jedediah rose on his own, using the wall for support, and practically fell onto the bed. Remembering how MacCray had propped up the leg, Gideon pulled the pillow out from under Jedediah‟s head and lifted the leg gently, sliding it underneath. “I have a pack, north of town,” Jedediah said, but his voice sounded willowy and faint, like he was falling asleep right this minute. “I can fetch it for ya.” “No, I….” Jedediah pushed up onto his elbows, and seemed to force alertness into his frame. “I will probably die,” he said, and while Gideon wanted to object, he‟d seen that wound. “If I do, you should take my things. Sell them for whatever you can get. It is all I have to repay your kindness.” “Less talk of dying,” Gideon frowned, and tried to ease him back down. “Less lying,” Jedediah argued, struggling against the pressure of Gideon‟s hands on his shoulders. He was stronger than he looked, and Gideon was just about at the end of his patience. “Make you a deal, Jedediah,” he said shortly. “You get the sleep your body‟s so clearly aching for. When you wake up, we c‟n talk about death all you want.” The Indian seemed to take comfort from the words, though, and nodded soberly. He fell back to the mattress and extended his hand. When Gideon made to take it, Jedediah slipped his own hand past Gideon‟s, grasping his wrist. It wasn‟t a surprise. The Indians he knew did the same thing when they were serious about something. “We have an agreement,” Jedediah said. “Yeah,” Gideon said softly, wondering at how quickly this man would have died if the townsfolk had run him off. Wondering how quick he might die anyway, as sick as he was. “You rest now. I‟ve got belongings at the depot, clothes and such. Reckon my jacket‟ll make a soft enough pillow until we find something better.”

“I do not need a pillow,” Jedediah said. His eyes were closed, and while his face glowed with fever, the tension in it had eased some. “As you said, I just….” He yawned, proving his point. “Need sleep.” “Best thing for ya,” Gideon agreed, though in fact he had no idea at all if it was. “I‟ll duck out and collect my things.” Maybe trade in his train ticket for a future date, or cash it out until he knew when he‟d be traveling. He had more than two weeks of sightseeing built into his schedule. Surely Jedediah would be better or dead by then. “Don‟t—” Jedediah started, then stopped with a sigh. “Please come back. It is not safe for Lakota to be alone in houses of prostitution.” Gideon knew he was being foolish, making promises, but it didn‟t keep him from doing it. “You‟ll be all right here. And I‟ll be looking after you. My guess is, you‟ll still be asleep when I get back.” He waited a few minutes more, watching as Jedediah‟s breathing evened out. His lips parted enough to show the glint of white teeth as he fell into the restless sleep of the sick. Gideon watched him for a time, watched the firm chest rise and fall gently under his linen shirt, watched how dark eyebrows twitched with dreams. He let himself out the door, to find Miz Howard and pay her, maybe give her a little extra for her silence. Gideon used the full hour he‟d promised and then some, because he‟d decided not to put his horse up at Tom‟s livery. He‟d taken Star and her tack to a stable west of the depot. No sense inviting gossip about why he was still hanging around, and while Tom would hear about it eventually, Gideon didn‟t want to hurry the news along. Tom himself might not do anything rough, but Gideon was suspicious of Jacob now and didn‟t want that boy anywhere near his horse. Loaded with his suitcase and saddlebags, Gideon let himself in through the front door of Miz Howard‟s house and bumped straight into Lila, who was sitting wait in the parlor. “Gideon!” she said with some surprise. “I thought you‟d done said your goodbyes, darlin‟.” “Well, I did, Miss Lila, but plans changed on me.”

“Well,” she said, eying him up and down in a way that warmed his belly, “I‟m free at the moment….” He grinned. “And I‟d love the opportunity to take advantage of that, but I‟m kind of stuck on sick duty. Met a feller who got himself gored by a wild boar and needs looking after. Miz Howard let me rent the back room that used to be Jose‟s, and I reckon my time‟s gonna be et up looking after the man.” Lila‟s frown cleared as fast as it came. “Josephine‟ll be glad for the rent, no two ways about that.” She rose gracefully and sidled up against him, resting her hand on his hip just above his gun belt. “So, how long will you be staying?” Lila had been a powerful temptation these past months, but Gideon found his mind drifting toward Jed already, and resisted a grimace. “Can‟t rightly say. The man‟s bad off. Doc MacCray don‟t even know if he‟s gonna live to tell the tale.” The thought saddened him, but he was glad, too, that Jedediah wouldn‟t be dying alone in the woods somewhere. “So, could just be a short while.” “Aww, ain‟t that sad?” Lila said, and he could tell she meant it. Part of the reason he‟d chosen her was because when they weren‟t fucking, she liked to chat about the world and asked him often for stories of his travels. She genuinely cared about people, at least when she wasn‟t actively doing her job, and Gideon understood that well enough. In smaller towns his mother did trick shooting, but she was no Annie Oakley. In the cities big enough to tolerate one, his mama worked the peep show, and she was much the same—distant when working, professional—but when the clothes went back on, she could be as friendly and warm with the men who‟d watched her as she was with her own family. Gideon reckoned a woman had to do that, separate herself a little from all that false intimacy and lust. But the good ones, like his ma and Lila, they could spot the difference in folks who wanted nothing more of them, and folks who did. “Yes‟m, it is.” He hefted his suitcase a little higher. “I‟d best get back there, see how he‟s doing.” “You come out and visit, if you‟re of a mind, Gideon.” “I‟ll do that, Lila. Thank you kindly.”

He tiptoed through the house and knocked quietly at the door, not wanting to wake Jedediah if he was asleep, but not wanting to startle him if he wasn‟t. He was, his face as flushed as a dark-skinned man‟s could get, and he‟d caught another fever, looked like. Gideon set his suitcase down and reached in the side pocket for a book, thinking to while away the time a little, but Jedediah twisted on the bed and woke with a start when the movement jostled his leg. “Ahh!” he groaned, before setting his teeth against any further sound. “I‟m back,” Gideon called from the chair. Jedediah‟s gaze flew right to him. “I wasn‟t sure you would be,” he said, panting. Gideon frowned at him. “I‟ve done proved myself to you, Jedediah. I don‟t like thinkin‟ I‟ll need to do it over and over again.” Jedediah looked flustered, but he dropped his head back down to the mattress, his sweat-sheened face turned Gideon‟s way. “I‟ve slept,” he said simply. “How do you feel?” “Close to death,” Jedediah mumbled, “and very cold. But grateful for your efforts, and your doctor‟s.” “Leg hurt bad?” Jedediah nodded. “I‟ve got some of that saly—sallyci—” “Willow bark,” Jedediah corrected. “Please. My stomach has never minded the tea.” “Well, that‟s good to hear,” Gideon said just to fill the silence with cheerfulness, and bustled around, poking for a spoon until he found one in a drawer, along with a single knife and fork and tin cup. “Be right back, I‟m gonna get some warm water.” The kitchen sat just across the hall from this room, and its twoburner Franklin stove had a little fire banked in it, not enough to boil water but plenty to heat the enamel kettle, so Gideon sat to wait for it.

When the kettle was hot to the touch, he half-filled the cup and made his quiet way back to Jedediah‟s room. He guessed the measurement of the powder, used the spoon to stir it in, and pressed the cup into Jedediah‟s hands. “Here you go. This‟ll fix you right up.” Again, that ghost of a smile that Gideon had figured out already was the man‟s way of laughing at him, but Gideon didn‟t mind. It warmed him that this Indian thought he could. He sat on the bedside and reached under Jedediah‟s shoulders, helping him into a half-sit to make sipping the water tincture easier, watching his face pucker up in distaste. “My people make this taste better than your people do,” Jedediah said. Gideon had found that the Indians traveling with Bill Tourney‟s show could make quite a few things taste better than their chuckwagon cook could, so he just nodded agreement. Holt MacCray, on the other hand, could burn water; Gideon had seen him boil a pan dry when he got distracted with some medical task or other. When the cup was empty, Gideon helped settle Jedediah back on the mattress and laid the back of his hand to the sweaty forehead. Hot. Very hot. And the dark blue eyes looked glassy. “Feel like I ought to have the Doc check on you again.” “For what?” Jedediah asked. “I am wounded. Sickness is in the wound. I will probably die.” Gideon pursed his lips, but he couldn‟t argue, not just yet. Still, “Less talk of dying, huh? You‟re gonna depress me after I‟ve gone to all this trouble to help you stay alive.” “You have gone to this trouble because you have a brave heart,” Jedediah said, his words melodic, measured like the quiet, steady beat of a drum. “And you said, after I slept, we could speak of death.” Tarnation. “How about, after Doc MacCray comes by tonight? Let him tell us what your chances are before you start planning your burial.” It seemed like just the wrong thing to say, because Jedediah stiffened and carefully used his hands to push himself up, leaning

against the bed‟s headboard. “No burial,” he said, anxious. “We do not bury our dead.” Gideon frowned. “Well what the hell do you do with ‟em? Leave ‟em for the coyotes?” Jedediah grimaced, and his whole demeanor changed. “I do not want to die. I have things left undone, family left who should know….” His eyes got glassier, and Gideon realized it was tears now, not fever, in them. “Hey, now,” he said gently, and moved to sit on the edge of the bed again. “Doc MacCray wouldn‟t have made the effort if he thought there was no hope.” “Hope is not belief,” Jedediah said tiredly, as clearly taken by the fever as he was by his feelings. “Hope is what you have when there is no belief.” Gideon reached and took one of the over-warm hands in his, holding it gently. “All right then,” he said, feeling a little choked up himself, “where‟s your family? Who ought to know, if you don‟t…?” Jedediah sighed, and the tears spilled down across his expressionless face. “If my brothers or sisters still live… they‟re likely surviving on the Standing Rock reservation in North Dakota. Under the watchful eye of your United States military.” He blinked and a shudder went through him. “I do not wish to die alone.” “You‟re not alone,” Gideon said firmly. “If this takes you, I can promise you that. You ain‟t gonna die alone.” Jedediah‟s eyes seemed to pierce him, and Gideon withstood the scrutiny. The Indians in Bill Tourney‟s show had a way of doing that, of making him feel like they were staring at his soul instead of his face, so it wasn‟t so foreign to him. “I still have no one to carry my hair.” Gideon had learned something about Indian ritual from the Indians in the show, and he knew the men let their hair grow longer than plenty of women did, but he‟d never heard nothing about the why of it. “What?”

“When one of my people dies, we honor him or her. We cut their hair, and braid it, and tie the ends with leather. We carry it on our bodies for a year, to give them a life to follow, if need be, before they finish their journey.” The words sounded so serious, so important, Gideon couldn‟t help but feel them to his soul. The practice sounded a bit like carrying a picture in a locket, and he knew how important that kind of thing was to his mama. She had a picture of her daddy, a man who‟d died when she was just a baby, and she treasured it more than the gold locket that held it. Gideon swallowed. “I—would it be all right, having a white man do it?” Jed studied him, his features crinkled in pain or worry. “To follow a white man‟s spirit?” He frowned slightly. “I would ask you to try to find some of my family. I know the reservation is far from you, but perhaps, if you know of someone near to it….” Gideon nodded, even though he wasn‟t sure. The show‟s route was similar from year to year, but not always the same. No use worrying on that now, though. “I‟ll look for someone of your blood to give it to—but if that don‟t work, I‟ll ask my Indian friends to do what‟s right by you. I promise, Jed.” Jedediah blinked then frowned. “Jed?” “Short for your whole name, like—” Jed tugged his hand from Gideon‟s and waved the words away. “I know what it is. I have not been called that since….” He turned his head away. “In many years.” “You mind me callin‟ you that?” No words, but Jed shook his head, and Gideon nodded, glad. “Can we stop talkin‟ about dying now?” “No,” Jed said stubbornly. Already, in just this short time, Gideon had a sense of how stubborn the man could be. “If I die,” he went on, and Gideon took secret pleasure in the fact that Jed was saying „if‟ now, even as he listened intently to the burial customs Jed was trying to teach him. He‟d never burned a body, and the thought sounded

gruesome to him, but Jed‟s people seemed to think that the spirit got lifted out of the body in the smoke, and carried up to heaven. After listening to the whole ritual, Gideon had to admit that it didn‟t seem so much worse than planting a corpse in the ground for the worms to eat. “All right now, we‟ve done covered it all, right? I take your body into the woods, find me a clearing, and build the pyre out of pine boughs. Put your body in the middle, set the wood afire, and—it all right if I say some words?” Jed nodded, somber, and Gideon nodded back. “So I say some words, and then I wait for the fire to burn out good. Scatter the ashes and the remains. If I haven‟t found one of your kin, I‟ll talk to my other Indian friends, or I‟ll keep your hair in my coat pocket for a year, then set it loose in the wind someplace wild. That about it?” “Yes.” “Then no more talk of dying, Jed,” Gideon ordered, determined. “Talking about it‟s as like to bring it on as that infection in your leg.” “That is….” Jed frowned. “Your people believe that? I never learned that from the nuns.” Gideon didn‟t know nothing about nuns, but then, he didn‟t have much in the way of religious practice, himself, other than what he‟d heard from the tent preacher who‟d traveled a while with Bill Tourney‟s show. Jed clearly knew more about the Christian Bible than Gideon did. “Don‟t know what regular church folk believe,” he admitted. “I just know my pa says that talking about trouble is like to bring it home. So no more talk of dying.” “What do you talk about?” “My family, my friends, the animals we work with in the traveling show….” Jed frowned. “Traveling show?” Gideon nodded. “That‟s right. My folks both work in Bill Tourney‟s Traveling Wild West Show,” he said proudly. “Bill, the owner, says his was the biggest and the best, before Buffalo Bill came along, and me, I was born into it. My daddy works with horses, trick riding and roping, and he did some bronc riding back when I was a kid.

More circus-type stuff now. My ma works a—” he cleared his throat, “a ladies‟ show, when she ain‟t trick shooting.” His mother wasn‟t ashamed of her job, and neither was Gideon or his daddy, but you never knew how some men might take it. Jed nodded, interested. “I know of these shows. Many of my people have traveled with them. Talk of that, Gideon,” he said, his eyes still fever-bright. “Tell me of your life.” That was as easy as breathing for Gideon Makepeace. He smiled and started in, telling tales of when he was knee-high to a grasshopper, scrambling underneath horses‟ bellies to, as his pa had said, cause as much consternation as he could, watching the performances and learning to ride before he could even climb up on a horse without a boost from his pa. Jed‟s eyelids started drooping just a few minutes into the tale, but Gideon kept talking until he was sure the man was asleep, glad he could offer him a little peace. Gideon returned to his book, but kept an eye on the rise and fall of Jed‟s chest, anxious that he‟d slip away if Gideon didn‟t keep watch and annoyed at his own fancy. As if staring at the man would keep him breathing. His pa would have all sorts of things to say about that, when he told him this tale. A quiet rap on the door drew him away, but it was just Miz Howard. “We‟ll be sitting to supper soon, Gideon,” she said with barely a glance past him to the sleeping Indian. “Ten cents each if you want to partake here.” “Much obliged, ma‟am.” It was cheap, less than half the price of a restaurant meal, and he was proud of her for only covering her expenses on it. He glanced back over his shoulder. “Don‟t reckon he‟ll be eating, but I might try and get some broth down him later.” She nodded. “Dining room, few minutes from now. You‟re welcome to sit down with us, but he‟d best eat in here.” “Sounds like a good idea,” Gideon agreed, meaning it even. Eight women worked this house. There was no way at least a couple of them wouldn‟t hate to see an Indian in their home, and Gideon didn‟t want to start trouble any sooner than he had to. “Doc MacCray said he‟d be stopping by tonight to check on Jedediah.”

Miz Howard frowned. “Jedediah? That‟s an awfully white name.” Gideon thought about the nuns. “Guess he was brought up in a boarding school, like most these days,” he offered. “Jedediah‟s Biblical. Don‟t know what it means, but it ain‟t Indian.” “„Blessed of the Lord‟,” she quoted, not quite scoffing at the idea, but Gideon smiled. “I don‟t know. I kind of like it.”

HE RETURNED from dinner with the broth of a stew Miz Howard had made, and he managed to get Jed awake enough to take some of it. His fever was down a little, but after a few swallows, Gideon was afraid Jed might lose what he had in his stomach. He set the rest of it aside. MacCray came by as promised, peeled off the bandages and poked at the leg, and Gideon kept his face turned away until the doctor was done. “What are his chances?” Gideon asked MacCray as the man was finishing up his visit. Jed was almost but not quite unconscious, his arm once more over his eyes and his breathing fast and shallow. When called to assist, Gideon had helped MacCray wash out the wound again, and it looked to be about as bad as it had been that afternoon. The towel they‟d put down during the procedure, as MacCray called it, was wadded up on the floor, ruined with blood and pus, and Gideon had already started thinking about the cost of replacing the linens, too. MacCray shrugged. “Depends on how the night goes. Reckon you‟re in the worst of it now—fever‟s climbing and the infection‟s deep, but I don‟t see that it‟s spread any more than it was this afternoon. That‟s good news,” he said, but he was frowning. “Every couple of hours, you need to soak that bandage with carbolic and wash it out, just like we did. Keep him dosed up with laudanum if he‟ll let you, otherwise keep him on the salicylic. And get as many fluids into him as you can. I‟ll stop by first thing in the morning, before I open up my office.” He grinned then and added, “If I don‟t spend the night here, anyway.”

It was the first time he‟d hinted at the relationship he carried on with Miz Howard, which was common-enough knowledge but not something said to either of their faces. Gideon wondered if it was because he was asking for MacCray that she had given in about this room. It was a long night, one of the longest Gideon had had in years. He spent part of it, when he was trying to stay awake so he could change the bandage and doctor the leg, thinking on the last time he‟d had a night like this. Maybe the time his ma had been so sick. She‟d taken a fever one winter, when they were in Abilene, and he and his pa had tended to her three long days and nights, taking turns staying at her bedside and minding his younger siblings. By the time her fever had broken, he wasn‟t sure who had been in worse shape, her from the illness or them from the tending. It was like that now, with Jed. He changed the bandage regularly, washing it out in a bowl of carbolic and then suffering through Jed‟s pained hisses as he gently wiped out the wound before putting the bandage back on. Each time, the wound looked a little better—or little less bad—or maybe Gideon was just getting used to seeing it. Each time Jed‟s pain seemed to be worse. Around two in the morning, Jed‟s fever rose, and he sweated so heavily that the sheets were soaked with it. Gideon turned him to his side and pushed a blanket beneath him to help absorb some of it up and keep him from lying in it, and put his hand to Jed‟s head a time or two, just checking: he was burning up. Jed mumbled things, words that Gideon couldn‟t make sense of, most of them in a language that must be his native tongue. Jed didn‟t get loud, but that was almost worse, and Gideon thought about having to perform those burial rituals. He knew the Indians in Bill Tourney‟s show real good. They took their rites seriously, and all Gideon could think now was how he might fuck it up and fail this fragile, lonesome stranger. If he couldn‟t find Jed‟s kin, he‟d do as he‟d promised, but it seemed a big thing now, too close. What would a Sioux god think of a white man doing Jed this favor? What would He do if Gideon did something wrong? He slept in fits and starts, curled up on the floor, waking up fast whenever Jed called out, but the man seemed in the thick of his

delirium, and never asked for anything. So Gideon would just hold his head and try to get him to drink water or broth, and sometimes sit on the edge of the mattress with a hand on Jed‟s arm. That seemed to soothe him as much as the salicylic or the laudanum—maybe more than. Toward dawn, Gideon was tending to the wound when he heard a soft knock on the door. He turned in time to see MacCray slip in, looking tired and rumpled. “Fever‟s up,” he said without preamble. Gideon could‟ve told him that. “It‟s been up for a couple of hours,” he said. “Doc, he‟s burning up.” MacCray nodded and tugged the sheet away. “Need to cool him down.” He wasn‟t wearing his coat or vest and his shirtsleeves were already rolled up. “Get me some clean water—the cooler, the better. Use the well outside, there should be a bucket near the door.” By the time Gideon got back, MacCray had managed to get Jed out of most of his clothes. The sight of him—all that brown flesh, dark against the white linens—gave Gideon pause. Slender and long-limbed, all lean muscle and sharp bone, Jed was a pretty thing. “Get over here with that water,” the doctor said, bringing Gideon out of his distraction. “Need to get this fever down—when did you give him the salicylic last?” “It‟s been a while,” he answered, setting the bucket down beside MacCray. “Want me to make up another tea?” “I want you to start washing him down,” MacCray shot back. “Try to cool him off—and keep him that way. I‟ll make up the tea.” “Me?” Gideon asked, hoping that his voice didn‟t squeak quite as much as it sounded like from inside his own head. MacCray frowned at him as he made his way to the door, picking up the vial of salicylic from the dresser along the way. “Just cool him off, Gideon.” Cool him off, Gideon told himself and tried to stay focused on that. But he was tired, and his mind wandered as he wiped a wet cloth over the hot, smooth skin. Jed startled easily, but he was barely aware. His body would arch toward Gideon‟s hand, but it had to be the

coolness of the cloth. Sick folk just wanted to stop hurting, and this Indian couldn‟t be no different. He still mumbled in his own language, but every now and then his eyes would focus on Gideon, and he‟d stammer out things in a mixture of English and the unknown tongue, things that sounded like “thank you,” and “don‟t cut off my leg,” and “no women, not here.” MacCray walked back into the room carrying a cup, and already talking before he‟d closed the door. “Let‟s try this. It‟s stronger, but I don‟t think it‟s going to matter at this point.” Gideon ended up sitting behind Jed, resting the heavy head against his shoulder while MacCray forced him to drink. Jed resisted at first, but Gideon whispered calmly to him, promising that it was all right, that nothing was going to happen to his leg, that he was going to feel better. All the while, he rubbed the wet cloth over Jed‟s chest and belly, trying not to pay any attention to the firm body under his hands. “Hopefully, that will do the trick,” MacCray said, drawing the tea cup away empty and wiping at Jed‟s chin with a rag. “Try to keep him cool and quiet. He seems to trust you.” Gideon wondered about that as he eased out from behind Jed and settled him back into the bed. Jed tried to catch his hand, holding on to it until Gideon had him still and quiet. MacCray nodded. “See? Says something good about you, Gideon, that you gain the trust of wounded animals and people alike.” Gideon grinned over his shoulder at MacCray‟s fancy. “That‟s me, Doc, animal tamer.” MacCray let himself out the door, and Gideon just sat there on the edge of the bed. After a time, the tea did its job; the flush of fever faded a little, Jed‟s breathing evened out, and the grip on Gideon‟s hand relaxed.

Chapter 3

THREE long, hard days went by, three days spent sponging Jed down when the fever spiked, reading himself hoarse when he ran out of stories to tell—which he wasn‟t sure Jed could hear anyway—and trying not to think about the things he‟d promised. Or about the feel of Jed‟s smooth skin or the tickle of his black hair as his head rested against Gideon‟s shoulder. Or about those quiet, clear moments that would come over Jed when he seemed almost fine, when he put all of his considerable attention and interest on Gideon. It was easy not to think about those things when he had to reach into his wallet to pay out for their room, board, and protection. It hadn‟t taken but two days for word about Jed to get around, and Gideon, tired and irritable, had coughed up the extra dollar when Miz Howard had come to him with a frowning sheriff‟s deputy at her shoulder. “He‟s like to make all kinds of trouble for us,” the deputy had said. Gideon produced a dollar and flipped it across the room to him. “Hope that‟ll help cover any extra work, Deputy,” he said. He even meant it. Deputies had a tough job even in a railroad town like this one, keeping the peace between locals and tourists, and more between locals and other locals, with so many Negroes and Irish and Chinese in this here town. It was worth the extra dollar to know no one would bother them here. Lila checked in on him from time to time, usually bringing food or something for him to drink as the days wore on. She came and sat

with him, listening as he talked to Jed and adding stories of her own, soft and lilting. He was glad of her company, between her clients, and he told her so. By end of the third day, Gideon was ready to have it over, willing to perform those death rituals if it meant Jed‟s suffering would end. The room stank of both of them, of sweat and fever, even though he kept the two tiny windows open all the time. He had come to value the time he got to spend outside, washing out the linens and cloths they were using. “He‟s one hell of a fighter,” MacCray said the next morning. “I expect today will settle it one way or the other.” He smoothed the hair from Jed‟s face in a manner that was surprisingly gentle. “Any guesses which way it‟ll go, Doc?” Gideon asked. Jed had been awake for a long part of last night, making quiet chanting noises, like a song with just a few notes, and Gideon had sat there listening, mesmerized by it, like his heart started to beat to that tune. MacCray shrugged. “He‟s gotten this far, and that leg looks better than I imagined it could when I first saw it. I‟d say he‟s got a good chance.” He stroked Jed‟s forehead again. Gideon felt a lick of jealousy at the overly familiar touch, which made him curse himself in the privacy of his head. That feeling told him plenty about his less than pure motives here. Damn it. “He‟ll make it,” Gideon said grimly. “He better—I‟ve put too much into this for him not to.” MacCray snorted but stood up and stepped away from the bed. “I hope you‟re right,” he said. Just in case he wasn‟t, Gideon decided he‟d best lay it all out, for himself if not for the insensible Indian. He waited until the middle of the day when Jed was asleep again and the ladies were otherwise occupied. He sat on the bed but held his hands tight together between his knees. “Guess I ain‟t the nicest of men,” he whispered, tilting his head to watch a face he‟d become all too familiar with. “Got some habits decent folk don‟t cotton to, and taking care of you, listenin‟ to you talk, washin‟ you down especially—they reminded me, powerful strong. Reckon you deserve to know that I ain‟t all bad, though. I didn‟t

take advantage or nothin‟. Reckon you deserve to know that if I have to do them rituals, I‟ll do ‟em as best I can, ‟cause you‟ve got me feeling right protective of you, Jed, and worried.” He chuckled a little, low. “Maybe if you make it through and get well, you‟ll rub me the wrong way, and that‟ll take care of these feelings,” he whispered. “That optimistic enough for ya?” he asked with a smile for the sleeping man. There. He‟d said it, said what he‟d thought and wanted not to say. The fact that Jedediah was still too caught up in his sickness to hear it was neither here nor there. It turned out, Gideon was right about Jed getting better. Just about dusk, his fever finally broke for good. It took Gideon a while to realize it. He thought at first that the Indian was dead, his body barely moving as he breathed so slowly that it was hard to see his chest rise at all. But while Gideon was working up the courage to touch him, to see for sure, Jed stirred, a slight twitch of his fist against the pillow, then a shift of his leg—the injured one. He made a low noise in his throat, not quite a moan. His eyes slowly blinked open. For the first time in days, they were clear—swollen and tired, but not fever bright or unfocused. He looked around the room, his gaze drifting past Gideon before coming back to settle on him. “How long?” he asked, or tried to. The words were mushy, like his mouth didn‟t want to work just yet. “Four days,” he said, smiling. “And three very long nights.” Jed frowned, his fine eyebrows drawing together and putting a furrow above his nose. “You stayed? The whole time?” Gideon pushed himself out of the chair he‟d been living in and picked up a cup of water. He sat down on the side of the bed and held the cup to Jed, helping him drink. “Didn‟t have much else to do. And I didn‟t stay the whole time. Had to see to my horse, make sure she was faring well at the place I moved her to. But mostly, yeah, I stayed,” he said, diffident. He didn‟t add that every time he‟d left, he‟d asked Lila to keep an eye on Jed, just in case. Jed‟s eyes widened, and Gideon saw a flash of doubt, so he went on more softly, “Told you, I have good friends who are Indians. I

wouldn‟t have left any of them to go through this alone.” He held up the cup again, pleased when Jed drank down more. When the cup was empty, Jed lay back in the pillows. “You are a good man. Better than I deserve to call friend. I thank you.” Gideon patted him on the shoulder, flattered at the words and sure they were sincere. “Let‟s see about getting you back on your feet now.” Getting Jed back on his feet took a little longer than the three days he‟d been at his worst. The Indian had had little weight to spare when he‟d first come to them. After three days of fever and virtually no food, he was weak as a kitten and bony as a mongrel dog. Miz Howard and Elsie were good about keeping a broth or a soup available for him, but it was slow going. The first day, Jed could barely manage to stay awake long enough to eat, and solid foods were still out of his reach. After that though, his appetite picked up and so did his energy. For Gideon, it was both a relief and another curse. He didn‟t have to be around as much—Jed spent almost all his time sleeping, more peacefully as each day went by—but Gideon couldn‟t leave yet, not with the Indian under his protection, as he‟d come to think of it. And not with the hole in his wallet. Between the four dollars a day for MacCray‟s visits and medicines and the two-fifty for room and board, his forty dollars disappeared fast. He‟d had to cash in the train tickets he‟d bought for the trip to San Francisco to meet up with the show, and while he still had enough money for one for him, he didn‟t have enough on him now for passage for Star. Boarding his horse had added up, too, and making sure Star was comfortable there. That meant short, fast rides and apples, which came cheap but still added up with everything else. He‟d had more than his share of needs to satisfy, sharing a room with Jed, and Lila had made a fine profit off his little stallion‟s wants, too. But his mama hadn‟t raised no cold-hearted son, and Gideon had held on to his charitable nature as he‟d passed into manhood. He could make the money again—hell, he had money in the bank in San Francisco, just waiting for him to get there. He thought he might ask Landon for a loan, something he could pay back once he got to his bank account in San Francisco, but he hated

having to beg for a handout. He reckoned Landon wouldn‟t think he‟d spent his money wisely, no matter the color of the stranger‟s skin. Which meant going overland—a long trip, but one that he could make in time to catch up with the show in San Francisco, maybe, if he got going soon. Very soon. It was late night of the eighth day—fourth day since Jed‟s fever had broken, that Gideon returned to the room to find Jed up and about. He‟d asked for his clothes as soon as the fever had broken, and while Gideon missed the sight of that bare skin, it had been a relief to find Jed well enough to be worried about appearances. Now, though, when he stepped into the little room, he found Jed standing in only his leather loincloth, his hair wet and water trailing down his bare shoulders as he washed himself from the bucket of well water Gideon had left in the room earlier. He stood awkwardly, using his injured leg more for balance than to hold his weight, but he was up and moving well under his own steam. It was a good thing Gideon had just left Lila, or he might have embarrassed himself. As it was, he looked away as Jed used a towel to dry his hair. “Good to see you up,” he said, closing the door. “You feeling better?” “I will be ready to travel tomorrow,” Jed answered, his voice muffled under the cloth. “This has cost you much—I know this. Far more than what little I had to give you.” Gideon hesitated, not sure how he wanted to say this. His silence must have been enough, though, because Jed nodded and the corners of his thin lips twitched, as if he would smile. “I heard you talking to the woman,” Jed said, filling in the silence. “You sold your train tickets back for the money to stay here. I would like to repay you.” Gideon stared for a few seconds, thinking, before he asked, “Do you know how to get to San Francisco from here? Overland, I mean? And fast?” Jed‟s expression tightened into a frown. “The fastest way is the train,” he said slowly.

Gideon shrugged. “Reckon so, but only if you can afford the tickets. I can‟t, not for me and my horse, and I sure as hell ain‟t leaving her behind.” Jed tilted his head to one side, and Gideon wondered how much he remembered from the day they‟d met. Enough, it seemed, for the Indian said quietly, “I can get you to San Francisco.” He nodded, clearly thinking. “We can leave tomorrow—” “Not that soon,” Gideon said with a smile. “You need another couple of days to get your strength back, and we‟ll need to get you a horse—” “Why?” Jed cut him off. “I thought you wanted this to be fast. A horse would slow me down—your horse will slow us down.” Gideon stared at him, wondering if the fever had come back or if it had been so high that it‟d cooked his brain some—he‟d heard tell of fevers doing that. “Horses need more rest and time to graze that a man does not. My people can make twice the distance in a day on foot, if they move fast, than on horseback. We always freed our horses, if our need was urgent enough. Your need is not that urgent?” The first words Gideon could find were the ones closest to his heart. “I ain‟t never had a need urgent enough to think about leaving Star,” he said, harder than he‟d intended. “She‟s my horse.” Jed drew a deep breath and nodded before he ducked his head back under the towel, rubbing the ropes of his hair in it. Freed to look, Gideon eyed the trim waist and narrow hips, the trim curve of his ass and the way the skin folded as Jed bent forward to dry his hair. “Tomorrow, I will get my pack,” he said, his voice muffled under the damp cloth. “Then we can leave.” Gideon watched as Jed draped the towel over the back of a wooden chair, then ran his fingers through his hair, combing it out as best he could. That had him arching back, his chest thrust out. Gideon turned his head away… for all of two seconds. It was hard not to appreciate the long black strands that seemed to flow between his slender fingers. In the soft light of the room‟s lamps, it gleamed, dark,

blending into the shadows around Jed but shining where it caught the light. Lila‟s hair was long, but not as long as Jed‟s, nor was it as thick or as black or as— He ducked his head, taking a deep breath and staving off the comparison. He scrubbed his fingers through his own hair, but it was more to clear his head than to do any cleaning. He sat down on the far side of the bed, toeing off his boots. They‟d been sharing the bed since Jed‟s fever had broken. It was big enough, and he was paying for the damned thing, anyway. Tomorrow? Damned Indian was foolish, crazy, maybe. Just what he needed. But the next morning, Jed was up and gone before Gideon opened his eyes. At first he thought the Indian had run out on him. That was a shock. That after all he‟d done, Jed would run off without a word. But as he dressed and packed up his things, he settled on anger. He‟d done all of this, and now he‟d been left to get himself out of it. He could do it, no problem, but it vexed him that he‟d have to. There would be someone headed to California soon enough, someone needing to get there before winter started setting in. He just had to get the word out that he wanted to go—at the liveries and at the restaurants and saloons, here with Miz Howard‟s girls; travelers moving West always liked to relieve an itch when they had the chance. He stripped the linens off the beds and left them by the door, knowing the house girl would pick them up along with all the others that were due for changing and get them to the Chinese laundry. He‟d paid extra for this, too, and for the towels he tossed on top of the pile. He cleared away the water bucket and all the things they‟d used before doing one last check of the room for his stuff and anything Jed might have left behind. The weather was pretty enough, and warm enough to sleep out in the open tonight—no sense paying to stay here anymore. Lila and most of the ladies were still sleeping, but he left word with Elsie, who was in the kitchen and the one picking up the slack now that they were fresh out of house boys, that he was done with the room and he‟d be by later to thank them all for the help. He grabbed up a biscuit on his way out the door—he‟d paid for that already, and it was

hot—so his mouth was full and his eyes half-closed as he made his way through the door and onto the back stoop to find Jed standing to one side, his pack on his back, his eyes closed as he shifted from one side to the other, testing his bad leg. Without opening his eyes, the Indian said, “If we leave now, we can make it a good way before night falls.” Gideon stood for several seconds, collecting his thoughts and getting past the surprise, hiding behind his mouthful of biscuit. When his mouth was empty, he said, “How the hell did you get out there and back?” He was thinking about the injury, watching the way Jed was still favoring the leg. The Indian looked over his shoulder at Gideon. “I was careful,” he said. “No one saw me. And now that you are finally up,” he said with a frown of disapproval, “we can get started. I will meet you on the road out of town. I do not think you need to be seen with me when you retrieve your horse.” There was more disapproval in his tone, but Gideon let it slide by like creek water. “You sure you‟re ready to go?” He looked down at Jed‟s bad leg. “I have been ready,” Jed answered. “I was afraid you had taken ill, you were in bed so long. If we are to make good time, we must move while it is daylight. We left the solstice behind months ago, and each day grows shorter.” “It‟s only August, Jed,” he said, amused. “Days are still longer than I‟d want to be hiking.” Jedediah raised an eyebrow. “White people speak of hurry, but they do not know what it means.” Gideon grinned and held up a hand when Jed started walking toward the alley, limping on the bad leg but using it anyway. “I paid for breakfast, we might as well eat it.” Jed looked warily back at the house, but Gideon just shrugged and set his bag down, darted back in, and found a scrap of cloth to wrap four biscuits and some bacon in. It would be a nice lunch on the road, and he‟d need to stop by a store, stock up on supplies for the trail. Jed hadn‟t seen Star yet, either. When he did, he‟d appreciate why Gideon cared.

As soon as the screen door banged shut behind Gideon, Jed started walking. “We‟re gonna be in real trouble if you get out there and that leg acts up,” he said, jogging to catch up. Jed paused when he reached B Street and met Gideon‟s eyes. In the morning sun the blue was still night-dark, but nobody with eyes could miss it, that one thing about him that was so completely not Indian. “You and your doctor have done very good work. I understand how close I was to having my hair cut. I will not waste your efforts by doing anything I am not ready to do. The worst of it was the infection, as your doctor said, not the wound itself.” Gideon frowned at him. “You sure?” Jed nodded. “The muscle is still healing, as is the wound, but if I do not use it now, it will heal weak and be harder to use later. We can walk—and if you are taking the horse, we will be walking slowly enough.” Gideon rolled his eyes, thinking that Star would be carrying Jed more than she would be carrying Gideon. He tried one more time, or started to, but Jed cut him off. “I am well enough to do this. Go and get your horse and head out of town. I will meet you on the road.” He glanced back once more, and the stormy blue of his eyes shone brightly in the morning sun. Gideon smiled at him and nodded. “I‟ll trust ya. Okay, I‟m going to get Star and some food for the trail. Won‟t be more‟n an hour. I‟ll meet you on Front Street, across the tracks and a little ways out of town. Deal?” Jed extended his hand, and Gideon grasped his wrist in the Indian way, then he took off up B Street at a jog. The memory of those shining eyes hurried him along. He ducked into Doctor MacCray‟s place long enough to find that MacCray was out on a house call and to ask that Elmer pass on word that he was moving on. “Old Holt, he‟s been in a darned good mood the past few days,” Elmer volunteered. “Yeah?” Gideon hadn‟t really noticed.

“Yep,” Elmer said. “I think he‟s feeling like he can perform miracles.” Gideon grinned; he‟d been thinking the same thing, once Jed had turned the corner. “Well, he did a good job with my friend, that‟s for sure.” “I thought it might be him,” Elmer said. “Doctor MacCray was awful close-mouthed….” Elmer trailed off, inviting Gideon to open his own, but Gideon wasn‟t stupid. “The poor fella had a bad infection, but the Doc got him through it. Tell him my thanks again, and that I‟ll write him a letter when I get to San Francisco.” He left before Elmer could try and pump him for more information, ducked into a dry goods store for hardtack, coffee, and a tin pan to cook in, then headed for the livery, and Star. He found her trotting around in the corral by the stable when he arrived, kicking up her heels and looking all kinds of frisky. Bobby, the eldest of the stable boys, strolled out of the barn‟s interior, wiping his hands on a rag. “Hey there, Gideon,” he called. “Howdy, Bobby. I came by to take this one off your hands,” he said, and whistled for her. She threw her head and trotted over, reaching her long neck over the top of the corral fence to nibble at his hair. “She weren‟t no trouble. Lots of energy, but docile as a lamb,” Bobby said. “That‟s what makes her special,” he said fondly. To his horse he said, “Time to go, girl,” and led her by a haft of mane over to the gate. “You mind finding Mitch so him and me can settle my account?” Bobby ran off and came back a minute later, carrying Gideon‟s blanket and saddle, bridle and bags. Gideon filled the saddlebags, weighting them carefully before he threw on the blanket and saddle, adjusted the saddlebags once more and tied on his carpetbag suitcase behind the cantle carefully so it wouldn‟t bounce around. When he fed Star the bit she stomped a foreleg, clearly ready for a run that Gideon would be all too happy to give her.

As Gideon tightened the leather at her cheek, Mitchell Freeman strolled up. He handed over two quarters and said, “That makes us square.” Gideon didn‟t complain. He was surprised to get anything back, since Bobby‟d told him Star had had her oats this morning. “Where you headed?” Mitch asked. “San Francisco,” he said, swinging up into the saddle. Star threw her head and tried to work the bit forward, a bad habit she developed when she didn‟t get enough exercise, and Gideon felt a little bad for neglecting her this past week. “You‟re riding?” Mitch asked. “Yep. Spent too much of my travel money to get Star a stall on the train.” “Long trip alone,” Mitch said. Gideon smiled again. It would be, if he were traveling alone. He reined out with a wave for both men and put the late morning sun to his back, let Star pick her way across the train tracks and onto Front Street. The buildings on this side of the tracks were more ramshackle, shacks and tired storefronts that petered out fast. He started looking for Jed almost immediately, but was maybe half a mile out of town before he spotted him, standing just off the edge of the road, his belongings in the big leather sack that hung from one shoulder. A Winchester rifle was tied to the side of it, surprising for an Indian—it was probably good he‟d left it hid out of town. “Didn‟t think you‟d carry a gun,” Gideon said as he came alongside. Jed shrugged. “Easier hunting than bows and arrows.” He frowned up at Gideon as he started walking, his limp pronounced, but it didn‟t seem to be giving him much trouble. “I could sell it. Maybe make you enough for a space for your horse.” “Not hardly,” Gideon said. “It‟s old enough, I doubt it‟d fetch ten dollars.” “How much do you need?” Gideon spurred Star forward without answering, and Jed set up an easy pace beside him, pulling ahead briefly then looking over his

shoulder and slowing his pace accordingly. “Don‟t matter none, I reckon it‟s decided. Hey, I bought a map.” “Why?” “To tell where we‟re goin‟,” he said, amused. “I know where we‟re going,” Jed said. “We are going to San Francisco, as quickly as possible.” At that he narrowed his eyes, and then rolled his shoulders. Gideon was fast learning that both were signs of derision. “In a hurry, but with a horse.” White men, the narrow look and the shoulders seemed to say. Gideon shook his head, but he smiled. At least he was going to have interesting company. They walked for a lot longer than Gideon expected, Jed keeping pace—setting it, more like—until Gideon got tired of sitting and Star started reaching her nose toward the grasses that grew alongside the road. “Jed,” he called. He‟d let himself get lulled by tall forest pines and a wide, well-kept road, and a hum Jed started not long after they‟d started, not so much sounds but words: hyunh-hya-hyunh-huh. Native songs, they didn‟t sound much like the chants of his friends in Bill Tourney‟s show, and they were so quiet Gideon had to strain to hear them, but he‟d learned that there were more kinds of Indians than there were different breeds of whites. The chanting came to a natural end point, and Jed looked over his shoulder. “Star needs water and I want to stretch my legs,” he said. Jed nodded. “Stream up ahead. Good water. Cold.” “How far up ahead?” he asked, suspicious. He‟d already noticed that Jed had a way of leading him by the nose, and they‟d only been on the road a few hours. “Ten, fifteen minutes?” He pointed downhill, in the general direction the road was traveling. “There, in the fold of the land. This road will cross the stream.” Gideon wondered if he ought to pull out his pocket watch, but he let it lie, and sure enough they came upon a brook, not wide enough to need a bridge. He could see the heavy ruts of stage wagons where their metal wheels had scarred the stones. The clear water burbled happily, and Jed found a rock, levered down carefully in deference to his hurt leg, and after a few seconds of

eying the creek, he stuck his mouth in the water just like Star did. It tickled Gideon to no end to see them both like that not three feet from each other. Did something else to him to watch that long throat work, sucking water down, but it was worse when he looked away, and his gaze landed on Jed‟s rump, sticking out at him and stretching the buckskin tight. Gideon cleared his throat and moved further upstream to get his own mouth wet. He used the pan he‟d bought for cooking, though, scooping water out and gulping it down more civilized. “You mind if we eat lunch, since we‟re stopped anyway?” “Oh, since we‟re stopped anyway….” Amusement rang clear as a bell in Jed‟s voice, and Gideon grinned at him. “Well, there‟s grass along this here creek for Star to munch on, and I‟ve got those biscuits I grabbed this morning. They‟ll sure taste good about now.” He took Jed‟s shrug and squat as assent, loosened Star‟s girth, grabbed the biscuits out of a saddle bag, and pulled off her bridle. “Don‟t wander, now,” he told her. “You talk to your horse?” “I give her commands,” Gideon said. “„Don‟t wander‟ is one of a lot of ‟em she knows.” Jed raised his eyebrows, impressed. Most folks were impressed by Star and the horses like her that he and his daddy had trained up. Gideon handed across the biscuits and bacon. Jed nodded his thanks as he took his share, eating silently as he stared out at the woods around them. Gideon found himself watching the Indian, puzzling over the sense he had that something was different about Jed now, but he couldn‟t quite put his hand on it. After a time, Jed rose up from his squat and said, “With all of this around us, I cannot understand why you are watching me—unless you don‟t trust me.” It was more a question than a statement, but it brought Gideon up short. The truth was on his tongue and almost out of his mouth before he caught hold of it, but his good sense won the race and managed to stammer out, “Just feels kinda like a miracle that you‟re still with us.

Guess I have to remind myself from time to time that I‟m not watching a ghost.” Jed blinked at that, and his lips twitched just a little before the ends turned up in a quick smile. “Need to get back on the road, if you can get your horse to move.” Gideon shook his head, but he was less skeptical than he had been that morning. When they got back on the road, Jed went back to the pace he‟d set that morning. Gideon, resting astride his horse, was of a mind to talk, but he couldn‟t think about what. “You raised up around here?” he finally asked. “Yes. And no.” Gideon frowned; that cleared that up. Jed went on after a minute without prompting, though. “My people were moved to a reservation in northern Montana when I was very young. I was moved away when I was still a boy, but near manhood. To a boarding school. I learned your language, and while I was there, whites found gold in Montana, and my people were moved again. North and west. I learned of your god, too. I was….” He paused and glanced up, pushing his loose hair back over one shoulder, “not very impressed.” “Well, there‟s lots of views on God,” Gideon said, happy to enter into this kind of talk. “I‟ve met folks back East who think the Bible‟s all about peace and the light of God inside each man. And woman,” he added. Catholics didn‟t seem very generous to women, but the Quakers he‟d met were downright egalitarian. “There‟s Baptists and Adventists, tent preachers with all the hellfire and brimstone you‟d ever want, and—” “But there is no Hell.” Gideon blinked. “Your people don‟t think there‟s a place of damnation?” Most Indians he knew didn‟t, unless they‟d been converted, and even those could have their doubts about the concept. Jed waved a hand, taking in the pines that towered above them and the mountains that stretched taller than that. “Your people dig into

the earth for precious metals. I‟ve been told that most of the time, it‟s cooler underground than up here. They say they‟ve dug as deep into the earth as that mountain stands tall,” he said, pointing again. “No Hell.” Gideon chewed on that for a moment, and frankly he liked the sound of it. For sure, his inclinations would damn him even if his absence from church pews didn‟t. “Maybe it‟s deeper than man can dig.” “Maybe it doesn‟t exist,” Jed countered. “Why would your god create a place solely for suffering, when a man‟s spirit can cause all the suffering it wants for without any help from the divine?” Gideon grinned. He was liking this man, this peaceful Indian brave, more with each passing minute. He leaned over his saddle horn, stretching his back—and giving himself a finer view of the lean form in profile under the guise of checking the man‟s gait. Each step seemed surer than the last, so maybe Jed was right about giving that leg some exercise. “This is beautiful country,” he said after a time. “Lots of folks call it God‟s country—looks like we‟ll be camping in it tonight.” “I expect we‟ll reach Bozeman first.” “Hell, no, we won‟t,” Gideon said, rejecting that idea firmly. Bozeman was over 35 miles away, across hilly land and curvy roads; he‟d checked on his map before folding it up and stuffing it into a pocket of his suitcase. “An eight-horse team wouldn‟t make it from Livingston to Bozeman in a day, and that‟s with a stop and a change for fresh horses.” Jed glanced over his shoulder again, sly. “Yes. Horses,” he said, but he was smiling. Gideon patted Star‟s neck. He knew she couldn‟t understand the slight, but he still gave her a pat just in case. After another hour, when it looked to Gideon‟s eye like maybe Jed was starting to limp, he reined in Star and slid off her. “Here, you ride for a while.” “No, thank you. She is yours.” “And I‟m offering to share her,” he said, annoyed. “You come up lame, and it‟ll slow us down more than the horse.” He wasn‟t at all

above using a little manipulation to get his way, and if he was the one walking, he could set a slower pace. Jed eyed the horse with a frown, and Gideon frowned back. “She‟s plenty docile, Jed,” he said. Jed shook his head, and his long hair fluttered back and forth. “It is not that. I learned to ride long before I became a man. Just….” He waved a hand. “Not on your saddles.” Gideon shrugged. “I ain‟t carrying it, so I reckon you‟re stuck with that.” He waited patiently while Jed looked at the stirrups and the height of Star‟s withers, and eased up alongside her right shoulder. “You mount horses from the left,” he said. “Not with this leg, I don‟t,” Jed replied. He gripped the pommel and swung his weight up and over, smooth as could be, ignoring the stirrups and letting his booted feet hang down past them. Star didn‟t shy, didn‟t even shift her feet under the new, slighter weight Jed‟s body offered her, and Gideon hesitated before handing up the reins. He set to walking and heard a quiet word from Jed, then Star‟s hooves clomping in the dirt behind him. A piece of him—the wrong piece—kind of wanted Jed to take the lead, because he‟d gotten a glimpse of Jed‟s ass spread across the saddle and liked it. Instead, he remonstrated himself for wishful thinking and kept his eyes front, taking in the scenery. It was worth taking in: tall mountains that looked sheared away on some sides, huge, ancient stands of virgin timber climbing almost to their tops—with the train through here, he knew this would all change soon, so he was glad to enjoy it while he could. Logging in the West had changed Seattle and San Francisco from the drawings of when men had first settled the areas, but lady luck smiled on this part of the country, or had until the Northern Pacific had pushed through; before the train, there weren‟t no way to get these trees back to the folks that needed them. “The clear cutting has already begun,” Jed said, almost like he was reading Gideon‟s thoughts. Far from being uncomfortable, Gideon liked that feeling. “Can‟t see it from here.”

“No. But further west, across the Continental Divide, and in all those places where they move the mountains for their coal and their metals, the forest is all but gone.” “Can‟t slow progress,” he said, quoting some old fool he‟d met along the many roads Bill Tourney‟s show had traveled. “It is not progress. It is….” When Jed paused, it was Gideon‟s turn to look up over his shoulder and wait. Jed was frowning now, his narrow mouth turned down at the corners and his fine brows drawn together again. He looked almost like he had those first days, when he‟d been hurting so bad. “They kill the land.” “Trees‟ll grow back,” he reasoned. “Maybe,” Jed said. He didn‟t sound hopeful, and Gideon could understand that. White folks had taken a lot from the Indians in the name of progress, and there weren‟t that many folks, white or not, fighting to hold on to any of it. He‟d heard the braves in Bill Tourney‟s show talk about the buffalo, seen photographs and nature drawings of the Great Plains to the south, covered with more buffalo down there than there were trees on these mountains. The only live buffalo he‟d ever seen, though, were the ones they kept for the show—huge animals, but mostly docile, and fascinating to folks who‟d only ever see them when the show, or one like it, traveled through their town. “Let‟s hope so,” he said, aiming for a lighter mood. They had a long trip ahead of them, and he hoped he‟d have more than impure thoughts to keep him entertained on the trail. “Yes. This is a fine horse,” Jed said. “You raised her from a foal?” Gideon felt like maybe he was being handled, but he didn‟t mind. He threw an appreciative smile Jed‟s way and nodded, then told the tale of Star‟s birth and of her unlikely name. She had a blaze on her face, not a star, but his daddy had told him she‟d be one, if he took proper care of her. “So that‟s how she got her name,” he finished. He looked back when Jed didn‟t reply, and caught the man smiling at him, looking both fond and amused. Mostly, he decided, fond, and felt his pulse beat a little faster. Down boy, he warned his prick. Not that it was showing signs of life at the moment, but he knew it well. It wouldn‟t take much

to stir it, and then he‟d be thinking cold thoughts and walking funny to hide it for the rest of the afternoon. They didn‟t make Bozeman, which caused Jed to grumble just once, but when they did finally stop for the night, he pulled a rolled blanket off the side of his pack and spread it out, and proceeded to gather up wood and build a fire while Gideon brushed Star down with the curry comb he carried, and loosed her in a patch of tall green grass. Talk was as spare as the fire, until Jed announced that he‟d fetch dinner before they lost the last of the sun, and Gideon listened to his rifle crack twice, heard the rustle as he returned with a wild turkey carcass trailing behind him. “Supper tonight, breakfast tomorrow,” he announced. “I‟ll take care of that from now on, you don‟t mind,” he offered. He was a skilled shootist, and he couldn‟t see how Jed needed to be on that leg any more than he had to be. Jed set to burning off the feathers with no more than a nod. That made a powerful stench, so Gideon pulled his own bedroll upwind and just watched. Jed didn‟t look like he needed any help tending, and it was soothing, watching the man‟s quiet efficiency as he skinned and spitted the big bird, propping it high above the hottest of the coals. “Gonna get chilly tonight,” Gideon said, already feeling it. This high up, the days were warm and the nights cool, not unbearably so but he was already planning to tug his bedroll nearer the fire and throw a little extra wood on it before he bedded down for the night. In answer, Jed stood, stretched his leg carefully, then picked up his own blanket and spread it behind Gideon‟s. “Warmer with two,” Jed said. Down boy, Gideon thought again. This was gonna be a challenge.

Chapter 4

TWO glorious days of travel later, plenty of which Gideon had decided to spend on foot strolling along beside Jed because darned if Jed wasn‟t right, Star was the slowest of the three of them over a long, hard day. She was plenty fit, but she traveled as much by train as any other means of transportation, and didn‟t have the stamina she ought to have. She‟d earn that stamina on the road, though, and until then, he was glad to have an excuse to keep Jed from pushing too hard. The sun was blinding by the time Gideon thought he could smell Virginia City coming up. They topped a rise, and he saw brick smokestacks. Coke and coal burned hot, smelting the metal right out of the ore and throwing thick black smoke into the air. The city was twice as big as Livingston, at least, and Gideon perked up right off even though they clearly had three or more miles of walking and one more valley to cross before they reached the city limits. “Hot bath, hot meal waitin‟ for us,” he said, feeling his mouth water. “For you,” Jed said. “I will wait here.” “Come on! We‟ve been out here for three days!” “I live out here,” Jed said, harder than he‟d said most anything else since they‟d met. “Still,” Gideon argued, “that‟s no reason not to visit.” Gideon looked at him and frowned. “Not everywhere is like Livingston,” he

said, hoping that was Jed‟s worry. “There are good white people—we didn‟t have trouble in Bozeman.” Jed met his gaze as he answered, “No, we did not have trouble there, but we barely entered it.” They had come across it in the midmorning and, by agreement, skirted around it, to keep moving. Jed‟s expression softened a little as he went on, “I know there are good white people. You are one of them, as was that doctor, and the woman who let us stay in her house—let me stay there. But I do not crave the company you do. Cities….” He looked back toward Virginia City, and Gideon thought he might have shivered a little. “Cities have little to offer me—work, sometimes, more at the forts than at the mining communities. I do not visit them unless I have need of a white man‟s town.” “Baths are a need, in my book,” Gideon said, testing. He‟d seen Jed strip down to his pants to wash—hell, he hadn‟t been able to tear his eyes away, those times—in just about every creek they‟d camped by, using handfuls of fine, clean sand to scrub at his skin then bending precariously over the water to rinse it away. Gideon had caught himself once hoping Jed would fall in, just so he‟d peel off those buckskin pants. “I agree. Which is why I‟ve bathed,” Jed said, quirking an eyebrow at him and purposely wrinkling his nose. Gideon grinned. “Hey, that water‟s cold. It could do damage to important parts of me.” Jed smiled and shook his head. “Then go into the city, if you will. I prefer it out here, where I can think.” “Sounds awful lonely,” Gideon said, because it did. “I am not always alone. There are many reservations between here and the great ocean. I have visited some of them. We may visit some of them on our trip.” That sounded right exciting. Gideon had never been to a reservation, though Bill Tourney‟s show had played close enough that they‟d had Indians in their audiences. Stone-faced and quiet, a little bit like the Chinese, they weren‟t the most easily impressed audiences, but they still came, and usually they warmed up real good once the show

was underway. “Still,” Gideon tried, “you don‟t think a nice, hot bath is reason to wander into town?” “Not yet, no,” he said, slowly, like he was thinking about it. “But you are free to go.” Gideon frowned. “Won‟t be as much fun without you,” he admitted. It was a small admission, one Jed must surely have figured out by now. Gideon wasn‟t exactly hiding his friendly feelings toward the man. That earned him another frown, though. “Your choice. I will camp south and west of the city.” That decided him. “Aww, come on, Jed, at least let‟s camp east of town. Give ourselves a little daylight to hunt up supper.” Jed‟s face didn‟t twitch, but Gideon could still tell his friend was surprised. Maybe even pleased. “There is a pond just west of the city. The water will be warmer for the bath you crave.” “Warm enough not to make me look like a boy when I come out of it?” he asked. Jed‟s laughter was low and soft, a little like his chanting. “Not that warm.” Gideon tried to hide his disappointment, because he really had been looking forward to friendly company and a hot meal somebody else cooked—butter, bread… his mouth started to water, so he dragged his brain off what it wasn‟t gonna get—he‟d had some practice at that all his adult life, and plenty in just the past few days. “You‟re cooking,” he said. Jed didn‟t even shrug. “Can your horse lope for a few miles?” “She c‟n trot, anyway. Why?” Jed didn‟t answer, just picked up his pace until he was jogging along, so Gideon eased Star into a trot. His suitcase rattled a little, so he tilted sideways as he settled into her pace and put one hand atop it to keep it from bouncing. They turned south when they hit a creek, and Gideon let Star splash through the water beneath the short trestle bridge Jed jogged across—no way would Star like to pick her way across that.

Cutting along the bottom of a hill that had been stripped bald for mining timbers, he was glad he‟d used some of the time in Livingston to get Star new shoes—they were good on the scree. She was surefooted, as sure as Jed at least, and when they crossed a set of tracks that ran south, Gideon saw the pond Jed must‟ve been talking about and reined her in. Her sides worked, her breath coming heavy but not hard, so he stopped only long enough to pull off her saddle and gear, then walked her around for a bit, cooling her down while Jed set up camp. The sun was low over the mountains now but still bright enough to blind him, and he was glad to turn his back on it and head to the fire Jed had burning. “I never did learn how to start a fire with flint,” he admitted easily. Jed looked up from where he was adding sticks to the fire to build it up, curious brows raised. “How does one grow to manhood without learning that?” “Their daddies know where to buy matches,” Gideon replied. Jed nodded. “Flint is almost as easy and more reliable. Even if it is wet, flint still strikes a spark.” Gideon hadn‟t camped much since he‟d become a man, preferring the familiar comforts of tent or train car or hotel room. Still, he and his daddy had gone off now and then when he was a kid, and his shooting made him a damned good hunter. Problem was, it was a lot more convenient to buy the bird in the store with its feathers already plucked off. “Most of what I know, I learned from my folks,” he said as he dug in his bags for the curry comb. “My parents used flint,” Jed replied, a fairer trade of information than Gideon usually got. He had the impression Jed was glad of his company tonight, and even if that was just fanciful imagination, he liked the idea of it in his head. “Build up the fire,” Jed said, rolling to his feet and reaching for his rifle. “I will find meat for dinner.” “Ain‟t really that hungry,” Gideon said, thinking about bathing in the pond. He kind of wanted sunlight for that, so he could see what he was doing. See what Jed was doing, too. “You‟ll be hungry at breakfast,” Jed replied.

Gideon shrugged and held his hand out for Jed‟s rifle. Everything but Gideon‟s handgun was packed in trunks and traveling with the show, but he had no trouble with Jed‟s Winchester. “I‟ll see to supper and breakfast, you see to the fire.” Jed looked doubtful enough that Gideon rolled his eyes. “I shoot for a living, Jed,” he said, exasperated. “I haven‟t had any trouble scaring up food yet, have I?” Jed‟s doubt cleared, but he still shook his head. “I will leave you to future hunts then,” he said easily. “I know this area. I will be faster at flushing out game.” Gideon wanted to argue so Jed would relax and get off his leg, but they‟d traded off hunting since that first night, and Jed was walking well by now. “Fine,” he said, and set to pulling out his gear while Jed walked into the shadows. He laid out his bedroll and plopped down on it, tugging off his boots and socks and wiggling his bare toes in the grass. Maybe Jed was right, he thought, looking at how his socks wanted to stand up on their own. Maybe he needed a bath more than he‟d thought. He got up and found himself a creosote bush and used his pocketknife to cut a long, scraggly branch, then shucked off his pants and shirt and, after a brief hesitation, his underdrawers, and threaded everything onto the branch. With a piece of string he tied it off and dropped the whole pile of laundry into the fast-moving part of the creek, the better to kill any fleas that had hopped on for a ride west. Then he sat back down to feed the fire, dressed only in his hat and his oilskin coat. He felt half a fool, but the picture made him smile, too, a naked cowboy catching the last of the evening sun while he waited for his buddy to bring home dinner. He never heard the rifle crack though, and after a time Jed returned empty-handed. Gideon earned himself a surprised look for his dress, no doubt, and Jed launched into an explanation without being provoked. “I saw ducks in the reeds along the pond,” he said. “Too small to waste bullets on though. I set snares.” “Don‟t seem like many folks have camped here before us,” Gideon said, just making conversation. He‟d seen no charred ground

from older fires, and as pretty as this spot was, that was a bit of a surprise. “Indians, mostly,” Jed said. He tilted his shoulder and started walking, so Gideon followed, to a circle of stones some hundred feet out from the pond and well away from the train tracks. Enough boots had traveled across this ground that he‟d first mistaken it for a game trail. But it widened around a cold fire pit, with trampled grasses and even some marks on the charred stones. Gideon had little talent for tracking, so he shot Jed a surprised look. “You knew this was here? You‟ve—what, been through here before?” “Yes. Many of my people travel this route east or west.” “On foot,” he said, testing. “Mostly. Horses….” He paused, clearly looking for words that wouldn‟t offend, “Indian ponies tempt white men.” Gideon couldn‟t fault the logic of that. White people‟s horses tempted thieves, too. If Star weren‟t plenty fast, and he‟d been traveling alone, he might have been looking over his shoulder more, himself. “Why didn‟t we camp here, then, if there‟s a fire pit already?” Jed led the way back to the flickering light and shadows of their fire, much nearer the pond with its tall grasses and stubby trees. “Bath,” he said shortly, then after a brief pause added, “More private. And the snares, now. We‟ll likely have duck or rabbit for breakfast.” “What about supper?” “Thought you weren‟t hungry,” Jed replied easily, then started stripping off his clothes. Gideon cleared his throat and pretended not to watch, not even when the buckskins came off, revealing a narrow ass and lean legs… and the long scar that Doctor MacCray had worsened when he‟d dug out the infection in Jed‟s wound. But the wound looked a lot better now. Jed had been right about the infection being the worst of it. “What?” Jed asked. “What, what?” Gideon countered, tearing his eyes away.

Jed said nothing more, just moved to the creek and started scrubbing his body down with coarse sand. Gideon, who‟d packed no soap, decided to try it, too, and knelt a few feet from Jed to copy his movements. His efforts brought a smile to Jed‟s mouth, so Gideon quirked an eyebrow at him. “What?” “You are learning the way Lakota children learn,” he said quietly, scrubbing a hand full of sand up his arm and into his armpit. “They watch their elders and copy them, only asking questions when they do not understand.” Gideon chuckled at the thought of that and at the image of Jed, a rail-thin kid, rarely wasting words as he mimicked what his daddy must have done. He cleared his throat. “That the way Indian kids learn most things?” he asked. Jed nodded. “Most things,” he said. Was there a certain weightiness to his voice, or was Gideon just being fanciful? He shrugged off the thought and followed when Jed stood and moved to the pond, wading in waist-deep then bending backward to duck his head under the water. The water was cold, but Jed was right; it wasn‟t nearly as bad as some of the creeks they‟d crossed that were mostly fed by the snow on the mountains. Still, it was cold enough to shrivel his prick and bring goose flesh up everywhere else. By the time he hurried out he was past ready to drag his bedroll almost into the coals of the fire and plop down, wrapping his coat back around him and watching Jed, who still stood by the pond, naked as a jaybird, wringing out his long, glossy hair. That got blood pumping south, reaffirming his manly parts and annoying the crap out of him. They were only three days into this trip, with at least three weeks in front of them, and already, Jed‟s form was driving him right round the bend. He slid his arms into his coat and his bare feet into his boots and dug out the pemmican he had bought back in Livingston, handing across a strip when Jed came over and wrapped his blanket around his hips like a woman‟s skirt. Rock-hard nipples stood out from the flat chest, casting tiny pointed shadows. Gideon sighed and dragged his eyes away before he invited a scalping. “Coffee?” he offered. Jed nodded. “Warm.”

Gideon filled the pan in the creek and set it near the coals, poured in a measure of coffee grounds, and sat back to wait. The silence preyed on him, just the sounds of running water and birds calling, not even cattle lowing on this barren ground. He watched the sun slide behind the western hills and sighed, disgusted at himself. Seemed he‟d be taking matters in hand when it was dark enough, and picturing that flat butt and those perky nipples while he did. He tried to recall Miss Lila‟s body—he‟d seen her naked a couple of times—but he was hard pressed to hold the image, not with this living, breathing, pretty man beside him. When the water boiled, he pulled the pan off and filled two cups, passing one to Jed and watching him grimace at the bitter taste, then cup his hands around the tin, soaking up the warmth. “You burned it again,” Jed told him. “You were as near the fire as I was,” Gideon groused, moody now. “You could‟ve pulled it off.” Jed sighed and nodded, and Gideon watched the light from the fire glint off runnels of water that dripped off his hair and down his bare back. “I could have.” Then he glanced over at Gideon and grinned. “So could you.” Gideon huffed out a breath and took a deep gulp of bitter coffee, feeling the warmth of it spread through him and pretending it didn‟t taste as bad as Jed said. It did; he couldn‟t make coffee worth a damn, never had been able to. Seemed like the more complex a thing was, the more likely he was to do it well. “Reckon we might as well put our heads down,” he said after a time. “Fetch your clothes from the water,” Jed reminded. Gideon huffed again, as annoyed at the way Jed made the words an order as he was by the fact that he‟d plumb forgotten about them, but he got up anyway and tromped creek side to fetch back his stick and his clothes. He threw them over a bush to start them drying before he rifled through his suitcase in the dark for a fresh change. Behind him, Jed pulled a clean, if rumpled, cotton shirt from his bag and slid it over his shoulders, but the man made no move to button it. Gideon sat back down on his bedroll, pulled off his boots and put on clean socks,

and he was reaching for his drawers when Jed knelt beside him and put his hands on Gideon‟s bare shoulders, gentle pressure encouraging him to lie back on his bedroll. He stiffened against the pressure. “What are you doin‟?” The pressure on his shoulders eased, and Jed knelt back on his haunches. “Men sometimes say things they don‟t mean, when they think another is dying,” he said, sounding uncertain. Gideon‟s mouth dried, and his throat tried to close up on him. “I… what?” “I heard you, when you said your words. That you wanted things… that you did not take advantage.” Jed frowned, hard enough that even with only firelight and stars to see by, the hard lines of it were drawn clearly on his face. “„Take advantage‟…” he said, as if he were testing the words in his mouth. “You may take advantage now.” “I….” He resisted the urge to shove Jed away for the insult and growled, “A man don‟t take advantage of nobody.” He knew what was being offered, knew the brave knew he wanted it, and it made him feel smaller than an ant on the ground to be thinking about accepting. Jed didn‟t react to the harsh words, though. He just tilted his head and nodded as if to himself. “As I thought. Still, if you want me, I am yours.” Gideon swallowed again, powerfully tempted. “You… you go for men?” Jed nodded. “You ain‟t just trying to pay me back?” Not that he might not still accept, but he‟d sure as hell feel bad about it, after. A shrug this time, and Gideon felt the weight of Jed‟s eyes on him. “Perhaps a little. But no, I would not trade something I was not willing to give. Not even for my life.” He leaned forward again, and water from the strands of his hair dripped down onto Gideon‟s bare thigh. “Now. Did you think you were speaking to a dead man or a living man, all those days ago in that room?”

Gideon‟s body responded so quick, he thought he might sprain something. He reached, pushing his fingers into the cold hanks of Jed‟s long hair, and pulled him forward. Jed hesitated at that, and kept his mouth closed for the kiss Gideon urged on him, even when Gideon used his tongue against the seal of his lips. “What?” he asked, drawing back a little and trying to see in the firelight. “Lakota do not….” Jed touched his own mouth with a fingertip, rubbing his lips before he reached to touch Gideon‟s. He bent forward, though, and pressed his closed lips to Gideon‟s. Gideon didn‟t try to open his mouth again. He just stretched back on his bedroll and grunted his pleasure when Jed‟s weight stretched out atop him. It was good, better than it had any right to be with long wet hair drawing chill fingers over his shoulders and chest. Better than last night when he‟d lain awake thinking about Jed‟s mouth and things that had nothing at all to do with kissing. A rush of heat swept him at the thought, and he buried his face against the join of Jed‟s shoulder and neck and breathed in the clean, cold, earthy smell of the man. “Lakota do other things with their mouths?” he asked, hopeful as hell. Jed had tucked his arms in along Gideon‟s ribs and levered himself above Gideon on his elbows. His hair hung down, screening his face from the weak light of the fire. “Like what?” he asked, and rolled his hips, brushing his smooth, hard cock against Gideon‟s. Gideon had to grind up against that, it felt so good. “Like sucking private parts,” he panted. He heard a short laugh, warm and amused, before Jed‟s weight settled more fully on him, and Jed‟s hands cupped his face, holding him still for another quick, close-mouthed kiss to his lips. “I know how to do that.” Good Lord, did Jed know how to do that. Gideon propped up on his bent arms and watched, shivering as that cold, wet hair trailed fast down his body, and shivering some more when Jed‟s warm, wet mouth engulfed the head of his prick with no hesitation at all. He felt the chill of air when that sweet hot mouth opened around the head of his shaft, and worried for a second about something Miz Howard had said about

how redskins smelled funny. He didn‟t want to smell funny or taste bad, because this felt too good to give up after one time, and they had weeks on the trail to do it again and again. Whatever Jed thought of the taste of him, the man‟s mouth drew off only for a second before the heat was back, and Jed was sucking down more of him. He grunted at the pleasure of it, that mouth doing more to him than his imagination had allowed for. Jed‟s tongue was wide and wet as it licked up the length of his shaft before catching on the flare near the tip, and despite himself, Gideon let his eyes fall closed and his head fall back to hang limp between his scrunched-up shoulders. He was caught up in the space where his thoughts and hopes from the night before met the reality of this minute. Dropping flat on his back he reached with both hands for that wealth of hair, but as soon as he touched it, Jed‟s head jerked off him and away. “Don‟t—” Jed started, and Gideon leaned up on his elbow, trying to peer through the darkness. The fire was close enough to cast bright glints of light down Jed‟s side, to show Gideon the length of one thigh outside his own, to show the shadow of Jed‟s cock where it jutted out from his groin and the lean line of his body, even the ribs that showed after fever had eaten all the fat off the man. But there wasn‟t near enough light to penetrate the screen of hair and show him whatever was hiding on Jedediah‟s face. “Jed?” he tried. “I wasn‟t—” He didn‟t know what he was or wasn‟t, so he started over. “I like your hair. Wet like that, it feels like water flowing through my fingers.” After a second‟s silence, Jed‟s hand returned to his cock and stripped it once, forcing Gideon‟s belly muscles to ripple in want and his hips to thrust up into the touch. “All right,” Jed said, and bent back down. Gideon accepted the offer but carefully, gathering up the hanging hair and clutching at it and doing his best not to try and guide Jed‟s movements. He‟d had a man or two who liked to take over the show, and didn‟t particularly appreciate it himself unless he was real, real overheated, so he reckoned he could understand the hesitation. Still,

there wasn‟t any hesitation in Jed‟s work down there, not in the firm suction or the flat stroke of his tongue, not in the hand that gripped his shaft and slid the skin up and down it, working him fast and sure. It seemed like seconds before he was on the edge, and just like he would with a gal, he grunted out, “Gonna come!” in time to let his partner pull away. Jed did, sitting upright astride his thighs and using both hands now, one pulling strong and sure, the other polishing over the head as his cock spat jism, slick and warm, that Jed swiped over the head and down the shaft, making it feel even better. Gideon lay there shuddering until he couldn‟t take no more, then he reached, grasping Jed‟s wrists to tug the hands off him. “Too much?” Jed asked, letting his hands be drawn away and up to Gideon‟s chest. Both were sticky-warm, and Gideon figured that meant another bath before they broke camp tomorrow, but he chuckled at the question. “Real good,” he praised. “Just enough.” He panted, letting his fingers play with the backs of Jed‟s hands, feeling sharp bone and lean tendon as his breath slowly began to settle. “You like it, too?” he asked. “Getting your prick sucked?” Jed‟s answer, like many of his answers, wasn‟t in words at all. He just climbed off Gideon and stretched out beside him, on the edge of Jed‟s bedroll furthest from the fire, turned his head Gideon‟s way, and waited. Gideon didn‟t have any trouble returning that favor, not even just in his socks and raincoat, which he knew he‟d find funny when he thought about this in the future. Jed didn‟t touch him, didn‟t guide him at all, not with hands or words, but his body was taut with the need for release, and Gideon ran his hands around the narrow waist, measured the curve of his hip, and sucked the smooth, dark cock all the way down. Like his smell, the taste of Jed was different, woodsy and with a hint of musk, but clean and cool. Gideon had been with other men whose smell put him off long before he got this close, but Jed‟s taste was new and different and easy on his tongue, and rich enough for him to want more. His cock wasn‟t the biggest Gideon had ever seen, but it

was big enough, filling his mouth just right. Polite, too, not struggling to get down his throat or bang against the top of his mouth, but letting Gideon do the entertaining. Jed didn‟t grunt or groan, which disappointed Gideon some but didn‟t surprise him. Jed wasn‟t what he could call an overly vocal man. Jed was more what he could call practically mute, he thought, his lips stretching tighter as his mouth tried to smile. Still, it weren‟t but a couple of minutes before Jed‟s hand touched his forehead, pushing his head away, and he sat back, watching as Jed grasped his shaft and milked it the last of the way, watched it spit and surge, white droplets turned gold by firelight arcing onto his concave belly. On his back, his hair didn‟t get in the way, and Gideon greedily watched the way pleasure drew itself on Jed‟s face, the way his teeth pressed together, and his lips pulled back almost in a grimace that Gideon knew didn‟t have nothing at all to do with pain. He grinned, fonder than he ought to feel, and grasped the tight balls, tugging them gently and watching how Jed handled his manhood, storing away the speed of the stroke for future reference. This trip had been entertaining enough already, but it had just now got a whole hell of a lot better. He reached to tweak a dark nipple that had kept him so fascinated even when Jed was abed and sick with fever, and he grinned more broadly when that smooth chest arched toward the touch. “Can I kiss it?” he asked, not wanting to make a wrong move that might scare this brave off, not after this. Jed blinked his dark eyes open and frowned. “What?” Gideon flicked the nipple again. “There. Y‟all don‟t kiss on the mouth, I didn‟t know if….” In answer, Jed just reached up and slid his hand around the back of Gideon‟s neck, drawing him down. Gideon fell forward, catching his weight on his hands, and suckled that little teat like a hungry kitten, feeling a thrill run through him at the tiny sounds Jed made. So that gets him going. Gideon admitted to himself that it did plenty for him. His prick twitched violently, but that was a lost cause, at least for a little bit, so he eased off the suction and fell down beside Jed, his back

to the fire, wrapped his hand around that lean waist and pressed right up against him, relaxed and sated to his bones. “We should dress,” Jed whispered. “We should do that again first,” he countered. “We are off the trail, but not so far that our fire can‟t be seen or smelled by passersby,” Jed said, and Gideon felt a chill run down him that dampened his lust effectively. “Uh… yeah,” he said, and took one last, hungry look. He didn‟t want Jed covered up yet, loved the way his shirt hanging open made him look more naked, more appealing than if he were stripped bare. But he sure as hell didn‟t want to get caught at unnatural practices with a man, neither. Jed was right, darn it all. Still, Gideon nuzzled the long neck one last time, smelling that fresh wild scent of the man before he rolled to his hip and reached for the clothes he‟d pulled out. He shook out his union suit and tugged it up his legs, sliding the sleeves up over his shoulders and buttoning slowly. Nobody‟d make a thing out of a man sleeping in his underwear. Nobody‟d make a thing out of Jed now either, his buckskins pulled up but loose at his waist, his dark feet bare, his shirt buttoned. “That was….” Gideon swallowed and chuckled a little. “That‟s sure as hell gonna make nights in the wild more appealing,” he admitted. Then it struck him to ask. “Why now?” “Why now, what?” Jed asked, and Gideon remembered all those times women frowned at a man for answering questions with „what‟. “If you heard what I said all the way back in that whorehouse in Livingston, why‟d you wait til tonight to mention it?” “Because you respected my wishes,” Jed said. Gideon frowned his confusion, even though Jed wouldn‟t be able to see it. “Huh?” “About entering the town. You could have tried to press me to go with you into the city. You could have gone in alone. You chose to stay with me.” Gideon‟s heart warmed at the thought that it was just that simple kindness of friendship already grown between them that had pushed

Jed toward this. He rolled on top of Jed, settling comfortably and holding his weight off the man with knees and elbows. “Have to say, I‟m damned glad I did,” he said, and leered. If Jed understood the look, he ignored it. “Dawn will come early, and I‟ll have snares to empty.” He stared up at Gideon for a long moment, though, before using his hips to nudge Gideon off. He rose easily to his feet, the leg not giving him any trouble at all that Gideon could see, threw a few more sticks they‟d collected onto the fire, and tugged his blanket around until it made a little angle with Gideon‟s. They slept head to head, their bodies stretched away from each other, as innocent a picture as two men could make if someone came upon them in the night. “„Night, Jed,” Gideon said, watching the fire and listening to night birds, scarce insects, and Jed‟s even breaths. “And… well, thanks.” “Good night, Gideon,” Jed replied. Gideon smiled. It sure had been.

WHEN he woke the next morning, Jed was gone. He‟d become accustomed to it since they‟d left Livingston, but this morning, after what had happened between them last night, Gideon had a few seconds‟ frustration that the man had risen and run off so quick. Morning wood was clearly pointed in the direction of Jed‟s blanket—or where Jed‟s blanket had been. When he‟d blinked himself a little more awake and smelled the coffee on the fire, he sat up and looked around. Jed‟s blanket was tied off on the back of his traveling pack, which sat on the other side of the fire. The coffee was good—not scorched—and he drank it down gratefully, wondering where his Indian had learned how to make coffee. His Indian. The idea stirred a fire in his belly, plenty of which was lust, but he knew some of it was friendly affection, warmer than just the idea of a poke and something more like he‟d felt for Miss Lila

after they‟d spent some time getting to know each other. Before he could study on it for long, he heard the soft tread of feet coming near and looked up to find Jed making his way through the tall grass, carrying a duck in each hand. Jed frowned when he saw Gideon and shook his head. “Morning,” Jed said, and Gideon raised his coffee cup, still a little bleary-eyed in the pre-dawn light. “Good coffee, thanks,” he offered after he‟d swallowed down a few more sips. His prick, which had started to settle down like a gentleman, was reacting to Jed working purposefully around their camp, to the way Jed‟s hip showed so clearly through that soft buckskin as he knelt down to start the hard work of plucking the feathers off the birds. “I don‟t know how you white men sleep so hard,” Jed said. “I woke, I loaded the fire, I made coffee, put up my bedroll, and left to get these,” he said, shaking the birds for emphasis. “If I had been someone else, you could have been injured or worse,” he added, right chatty, for him. “You could have been killed half-dressed.” He waved his free hand, indicating Gideon in his union suit and socks, so Gideon looked around for his pants—which Jed had moved, draping them over his suitcase instead of that creosote bush where he‟d hung them last night. Gideon grinned. “You‟re no better. Hell, night before last I got up to relieve myself and you didn‟t even blink an eye.” “It was very early, just before the moon set,” Jed said, surprising the hell out of Gideon. Gideon remembered that, seeing the waxing crescent just touching the horizon and giving him barely enough light to point his prick. “I was quiet!” Jed snorted. “I suppose you thought you were. You should be more alert.” He shrugged off the admonition. Indians got raised for a whole different set of skills then citified folks like himself, and Harold Crowe, the star brave in Bill Tourney‟s show, had the same kinds of talents Jed seemed to. “Good to know you‟re worried about me,” he said and laughed as Jed rolled his eyes.

The morning light was bright enough for him to see the flush that stained the Indian‟s high cheekbones, and it brought back that warm feeling he was enjoying so much. Gideon finally forced himself up and into his clothes and pitched in with the birds, pretty mallards, and they had them cooking about the time the sun crested the hills to the east. The ducks cooked quickly, fat sizzling and melting into the fire until Jed emptied the pan of coffee, rinsed it in the creek, and set it under the birds to catch the drips. They were on their way soon after, skirting around Virginia City and heading south. Jed set the pace as he had the three days before, and they made good time. They were quiet at first, and Gideon wondered if he had misjudged Jed‟s attitudes about last night. But as the sun climbed and the day warmed up, Gideon found himself caught up in the rhythm of Jed‟s chanting. Gideon wasn‟t chanting along, but he was humming to it, softly and without thought. About the time he realized it, he found Jed looking over at him, a smile on his thin lips. Looking at those lips reminded him of other things they could do, and Gideon smiled in recollection, wriggling a little in the saddle. Got an answering smile in return, so he was looking forward to stopping tonight. Definitely. The further they got from Virginia City, the wilder and rougher the country became, and Gideon slid off Star and loosened her saddle‟s girth, leading her along as he walked shoulder to shoulder with Jed. By the time the sun reached its zenith they were wandering through a flat valley floor covered in dry brown grasses and not much else, with treecovered hills sticking up on both sides. They were moving a mite slower, too, over the rockier ground. Jed had been doing well for the past three days, but Gideon noticed that he was limping a little now. “You all right?” he asked as they made their way more slowly down a hillside into the ravine they‟d been following. “You could ride for a little, if you like.” Jed frowned, but nodded, and Gideon was pleased that Jed wasn‟t about to let manly pride slow him down. Gideon still kept the reins though, mostly because Jed didn‟t reach down for them, and when Jed

started chanting again, Gideon listened to the guttural sounds, hynuhhyah hyah hyah. “What do the words mean?” he asked. Jed seemed startled by the question, and his answer was accordingly spare. “Words of thanks,” he said after a long hesitation. Gideon shrugged acceptance of that, and kept his mouth shut when Jed started up again a few minutes later. The chant was quieter this time, but Gideon ignored it, or pretended to anyway, and they walked along in companionable silence, both in their hats to ward off the hard afternoon sun. Just about the time Gideon was getting ready to complain about being parched—he‟d emptied his canteen an hour back—he heard water running up ahead. They skirted around a small hill to find a wide, shallow river burbling along and a wider ribbon of green grass and trees that relieved the dull browns they‟d been walking through the past few hours. The grass gave Star her own reasons to want to stop, and Gideon wondered if maybe he and Jed couldn‟t enjoy a little break, too. Still, he set to business after Jed slid off Star, watering his horse and himself, refilling his canteen, and then pulling off her bridle with a command for her to stay close, and then sitting back on his butt to let her munch on the tall grass for a bit. Jed seemed content with the break—he even broke out some of the leftover duck, and they munched on it happily, supplementing it with wild onions picked along the way, green tops wilting in the heat. But damn, they tasted good. “Ready?” Jed asked a few minutes later. Gideon was ready for plenty, but he kept his mouth shut for once and called Star with a whistle, scratching her behind the ears and giving her a kind word, since he‟d run out of apples and hadn‟t found another tree yet. Jed didn‟t mount up this time, so again they walked side by side on a road that ran just beyond the trees, whose roots fed off the nearby river. Gideon found himself dragging, not to slow them down but just so he could watch Jed‟s butt move, a tiny sway to his hips that spurred more than Gideon‟s imagination. He had to adjust himself in his pants. “We ought to stop for the night,” he suggested, “maybe get to bed early.”

He hadn‟t meant to be lewd, exactly—even though it had been hard not to think of Jed and the pleasure they‟d shared last night as he‟d followed that buckskin-clad butt over the course of the day—but Jed looked back over his shoulder, frowning. “The trail slows us enough,” he said. “We should go as far as we can. We still have enough duck for tonight and tomorrow so there is no need to hunt.” “How‟s your leg?” Gideon asked just before he slid over loose rock and sand and nearly landed on his ass. “Better than yours,” Jed answered with a snort. The next time they turned toward the river, the game trail they‟d followed dumped them in a little glen of aspens. Late afternoon sunlight dappled the grassy earth and sparkled off the river, and Gideon was about to put his foot down about stopping, the place was so pretty. Before he could ask, though, Jed set about making camp, clearing a spot for a cook fire and scouting around the glen, checking for— Gideon hadn‟t asked what Jed checked for, had just assumed it was any hints of cougars or bears, maybe signs of other travelers nearby. “Hey, what are you lookin‟ for?” he called as he took off Star‟s saddle and bridle and left her to eat and drink and rest. “Boar scat,” Jed said, sounding irate. Gideon chuckled and shook his head. It sure did vex Jed that he‟d gotten himself caught by that wild pig. “You ain‟t more worried about bears out here?” They‟d seen some sign, but hadn‟t run across any live ones yet. Jed patted his rifle and untied his blanket. “Bears are shy creatures,” he said, working as he talked. “They are no more interested in us than that tree over there,” he said, pointing. Gideon frowned at the idea, because he‟d heard plenty of stories about bears showing plenty of interest in the larders of folks‟ homes. But he wasn‟t going to argue, not as long as Jed kept his rifle close. “That duck‟s sure gonna be good,” Gideon said, changing the subject. It would be. He was hungry enough, and he still had a little hardtack left, but he was wishing for a stove-cooked meal, biscuits or cornbread, stewed tomatoes and greens.

“The river has trout,” Jed countered, and looked his way. “You like fish? Save the duck for tomorrow?” Gideon nodded eagerly. “Fine by me.” Jed dragged two flat rocks from the riverbed and set them by the kindling Gideon had piled up nicely. “Start the fire,” he said, so Gideon did. Jed hadn‟t had much success at tickling trout to the surface in the shallows, so Gideon knelt down with him to help, doing the luring with his fingers so Jed could stab them with a sharpened stick. Once they‟d pulled up a few, he pulled out his knife and gutted each fish, and Jed laid the cleaned fish on the flat rocks to roast. Gideon wasn‟t surprised that while the fish cooked and the sun slid toward the western hills, Jed stripped down and bathed in the water, again ducking his head into it and cleaning his long hair. He was less surprised when his manhood hardened at the sight, looking forward to more of what it had got last night. Gideon was torn between two hungers—the smell of cooking fish making him salivate, and the sight of Jed‟s naked body, knee-deep in cold water and arched back as Jed wrung out his hair, making his prick twitch almost painfully. He was a little surprised when Jed waded out of the river and walked naked to Gideon‟s gear, untied the pan from the saddle bag, and turned straight for him. Jed pushed Gideon‟s knees apart and settled between his legs, opening his pants with a familiarity that made Gideon forget all about the fish. In fact, as Jed deftly unbuttoned first Gideon‟s shirt, then the tiny buttons on the fly of his union suit and reached inside to draw him out, Gideon forgot about pretty much everything. “Yeah,” he panted—not the most brilliant sex talk, but it earned him a grin from Jed anyway. He watched Jed‟s dark hands on him, handling his balls and his cock, and sucked in a breath when Jed dipped his fingers into the duck fat he‟d saved from last night, stroking it down Gideon‟s rigid shaft. “Hell, yeah,” Gideon hissed this time. The feel of the fat, making his prick slick like a woman‟s juices would, eased the friction and increased the pleasure tenfold. That was before Jed reached back into the pan and then behind himself, and when Gideon realized what Jed was doing to his own backside, he didn‟t have any words left. He dropped flat to his back and grabbed Jed by the waist, urgent to bury

himself in that skinny little ass. Jed didn‟t hesitate, just slid his knees up beside Gideon‟s hips and squeezed them tight, like he was holding on to the barrel of a galloping horse, and Gideon tried not to smile at the image because there was sure to be some bucking involved in the next little bit. He peeled one hand free of Jed‟s waist and used it to hold his shaft, slid the other hand back over a neat little butt cheek and tugged it open, feeling with his shaft, lining it up and tilting his hips up to get the head in. Jed groaned at that, and Gideon couldn‟t tell if the look on his face was pain or pleasure. He knew what he was feeling, though, and that tight heat, slick with goose fat, felt like a little slice of heaven to him. “You, uh… you okay?” he asked, resisting the urge to just pull Jed all the way down onto him. As much as Jed had resisted the idea of Gideon‟s hands on his head last night, he didn‟t seem to mind Gideon‟s hands at his waist now, even though Jed had to know what Gideon wanted to do with ‟em. “I….” Jed‟s muscles squeezed his manhood almost painfully tight, then relaxed some, and Gideon gave into his need as gently as he could, urging Jed‟s hips down with his hands. Jed went, slower than Gideon might‟ve wanted but quick enough, his face still caught in that grimace that could mean pain or pleasure or both, but Gideon had been on the other side of this more than a few times. He was pretty sure he knew what he was seeing. Jed had gone quiet again, but Gideon wasn‟t nearly so reserved. He gasped and groaned, he cursed, “Aww fuck, aww fuck,” over and over again, and set to the slowest motions he could manage until Jed‟s lips parted and the intense concentration on his face eased some. “Aww fuck,” Gideon said again. “Jed, I—can I—” Jed dropped his weight fully down, closing that last bit of distance between their bodies, and Gideon felt Jed‟s tight-drawn balls press against his pelvis, rubbed up a little to feel his own balls touch the tiny curve of Jed‟s butt cheek. His hands kneaded compulsively on those cheeks, fingers burrowing into the crease and tugging them gently wider. Jed opened his eyes and looked down at him, and when Jed

smiled, Gideon learned he‟d never really seen Jed smile before. Tiny grins, looks of amusement he‟d seen, sure, but not this full-hearted smile of pleasure, of joy even, white teeth glinting in the early evening light. “Yes, go on,” Jed said simply, and leaned forward a bit, grasping Gideon by the shoulders, setting himself as surely and confidently as any bronc rider ever did. Gideon didn‟t need no more permission than that, and he started the ride for them both, pushing up and in, watching the little bursts of pleasure cross Jed‟s face with each thrust, watching that pleasure get bigger and better when he peeled a hand off a butt cheek and grasped Jed‟s rock-hard shaft, stripping it in time with his thrusts. It was fast. It was hard. It was so fucking good Gideon saw stars when he came, his hips arched up off the ground hard and high enough that he was holding Jed‟s weight, letting it put him as deep inside Jed‟s body as he could go, clearly as deep as Jed wanted him from the way his eyes shone and his mouth parted and his hands clamped like talons on Gideon‟s shoulders. Fingernails bit into his skin when Jed grunted and came all over him, and those little crests of pain just made the come better, made the bursts of pleasure harder, and Gideon sank back to the ground with Jed atop him, gasping, his body wanting to just explode with the feel-good of it. Jed looked to be no better off, and his ribs moved like a bellows as he dragged in great gulps of air. “That—” Jed swallowed and coughed, still panting. “Very good.” Gideon might have preened at the compliment if he‟d had an ounce of energy left in his body. As it was he felt limp as a wet rope. He cupped Jed‟s cheeks again, fondly now and less urgent, and nudged Jed up to let his softening prick pull free. He didn‟t know what he‟d expected Jed to do once their bodies separated, but it sure wasn‟t what Jed did, dropping heavily against him and pinning him to the ground, legs squeezing his hips and thighs, arms pressing hard against his ribs, mouth buried at his throat pouring hot wet gusts of air over the skin there. Still panting, Gideon let his arms wrap naturally around Jed and held him while their bodies quieted, while the dusk finally faded and

the stars came out over Jed‟s back, peeking through breaks in the leaves on the trees that stretched above them. “Can‟t believe you‟re a brave who rides backwards,” he said softly, feeling like lady luck, who had always followed him, had outdone herself tonight. A huff of laughter tickled his throat. “„Brave who rides backwards?‟ Where do you learn these phrases?” Gideon grinned and used his fingers to pull all of Jed‟s hair to one side where it tickled his shoulder. “The Indians I know in Bill Tourney‟s show. It sorta came up one night that I had me an unnatural interest in men, and they said it weren‟t unnatural, just different, like there‟s different kinds of snakes and different colors of skin. They said that to their people, I was just a brave who rode backwards.” “Hmm, I understand,” Jed said lazily. “My people say a man or woman is a two-spirit person, if they desire others of their own kind.” Gideon blinked at that. Somehow he hadn‟t considered that women could get on with their own, but it made sense to him. Finally Jed rolled to the side and stretched out, still naked where Gideon was still almost fully dressed. He looked down at the spatters of come on his union suit and wondered whether he should wash them out now. He wouldn‟t; he liked the idea of them stains being there, hid under his shirt while they trekked on tomorrow. Jed‟s skin was spattered from his belly to his throat, the drying seed shining in the soft light of the fire. It looked oddly pretty, the droplets sparkling on his smooth skin. Jed‟s eyes were closed, one arm pillowing his head, the other thrown back, and Gideon thought Jed might be sleeping, or at least on his way there. He took the opportunity to stare, soaking up the strange beauty of the man beside him. Working in the traveling show, he‟d met all kinds of men, some with the show, but more often in the towns they passed through, and he‟d been with a few. He was good-looking and charming, and he didn‟t have trouble attracting people who appealed to him, if they were of that bent. But this was the first time he‟d been with an Indian. The ones he knew, while more tolerant of the attraction some men might

feel for each other, weren‟t themselves given to taking their pleasure with other men. Looking at Jed now, in the aftermath of what they‟d shared, was as different from seeing him naked in that sick bed as a fuck was from getting poked in the foot with a stick. Back then, his appreciation had been tempered by the expectation that Jed was going to die and the struggle to keep him cool and calm. Now, resting easily with come drying on him, Jed was beautiful, his long hair thicker than most women‟s Gideon knew, and his features were strong but oddly delicate. High cheekbones, a long, slender nose, and finely-arched eyebrows gave him an almost feminine beauty that was tempered by the thin lips, sharp chin, and flat chest. His body was slim and almost hairless, his nipples not large but not small, and a darker brown that made Gideon think of molasses cookies. Below the waist just as above it, there was no doubt that Jed was all man. Even now, his cock worn out, it curled soft and slim along the crease of a thigh, surrounded by a thin bed of hair as black and straight as the hair on his head. Gideon‟s hand rose of its own accord, wanting to touch, but before his fingers found the warm flesh, Jed started, his eyes opening and his body jerking. He stared up at Gideon for a second before he caught himself, then he smiled. “You shouldn‟t have let me sleep,” he said, pushing himself up. “I should be dressed—” “I like looking at you,” Gideon said quietly, letting his fingers drift down Jed‟s arm. Jed blinked, his eyebrows drawing together. “You have simple tastes,” he said. But he held Gideon‟s gaze for several seconds before leaning forward and putting his lips gently against Gideon‟s. When Jed drew back, Gideon felt that pull in his belly, the one that wasn‟t about fucking, but something else entirely. It stayed with him as Jed rose and stretched, flinching as he shifted his weight from foot to foot. Gideon reached, worried, and touched Jed‟s nearest leg. “I go too hard on you?” “Yes,” Jed said dryly, “you are a stallion.”

Gideon whapped the leg he‟d just been tender to. “I‟m serious, darn it.” Jed edged out of reach, still moving like he was reacquainting himself with his body. After a minute he said, “You were there. You know I desired it.” “Don‟t mean I wasn‟t a little rough,” Gideon groused, not quite sure why he was arguing about it. Jed looked at him, and after a moment he knelt into a careful squat. “You were eager. It was very good. There is no need to be concerned.” “Yeah, but if you‟ve got the leg and your ass slowing you down tomorrow….” “It will be a shorter day, just like you‟ve been whining for since we left Livingston.” Gideon‟s ire rose until he realized Jed was teasing him, so he laid back flat on his bedroll and tucked his prick back into his pants. “You are such a pain in the ass.” But he said it fondly. Jed snorted as he headed back to the water‟s edge to wash off. “Not yet, but possibly. Eventually.”

Chapter 5

THE next couple of days passed much the same, their trip slower because of the rougher ground they were covering and because by late afternoon when the sun was in his eyes anyway, it was all Gideon could do not to grab Jed around the waist and just throw him into the brush alongside the trail. No, he didn‟t mind the pace at all. He was enjoying his time with Jed, not just the relations, which were damned good and more than he could have dreamed for, but the company, too. Jed was quiet mostly, and sometimes Gideon missed having someone else talking, especially when he tired of hearing his own voice, but he was coming to think of the sounds around them—birds, coyotes, insects, wind in the dry grass, the burble of an unexpected stream—as the voice of his companion. He was coming to realize that Jed thought the same of himself. They passed through Dubois, a small settlement that was hardly more than a couple of buildings and a stable. Gideon stopped at the trading post long enough to resupply them with some hard tack, jerky, coffee, and bullets for Jed‟s gun, while Jed waited outside in the shade of the building. No one seemed to give Jed a second glance—but then, there was pretty much no one around to be glancing. Two days out of Dubois, Jed walking ahead and Gideon enjoying the view as he led Star along, Gideon got his first adventure of the trip. He‟d borrowed Jed‟s rifle and shot five big geese the last time they‟d camped near any water to speak of, and they had three left with their feathers still on, tied across the skirt of Star‟s saddle, plus most of a cooked one from supper last night. That had been the last game to

speak of that they‟d seen, but Canada geese were big birds, fifteen or more pounds apiece. It was plenty to last them all the way to California, if it didn‟t go off first, what with the crabapple tree Star had sniffed out and some kind of pine nuts Jed found that they‟d harvested. Gideon munched on a handful of those nuts as he half-listened to Jed‟s chanting, but mostly he was caught up in the memory of what they had done the night before, when Jed had stretched out on his back and invited Gideon into him. He‟d relished the feel of Jed‟s lean legs wrapped around his waist, and the sight of all that jet-black hair spread out like a blanket beneath them. It had been the best yet, not just because he liked being on top like that, but because when it was over, as he stretched over Jed, they‟d kissed—and Jed had opened his mouth for him. He was thinking of that kiss, of Jed‟s curious tongue touching his, of the taste of coffee and jerky and the wild mint that Jed had found along the way and liked to chew on, when Jed slowed and then stopped altogether, his head lifting and one hand going to his rifle. Gideon‟s hand went to the gun at his hip in a mirror action as he looked around for whatever had spooked Jed. It didn‟t take long to find it. They were coming across the plateau from the right, a small group of Indians. Like Jed, they carried long rifles, but they had theirs out and pointed toward the ground. Jed glanced back over his shoulder, but he waited until Gideon came up beside him to speak. “We are on the lands of the Newe,” he said quietly. “Your people call them—” he paused then said slowly, “Shoshone.” Gideon felt a little thrill of excitement—he‟d liked Indians before Jed, and he liked them a whole lot more now, but Jed‟s face was stiff and still, and his eyes were trained on the men coming toward them. Gideon squinted against the afternoon sun and looked as well, counting five men, one older and four younger, somewhere between his age and Jed‟s maybe. “They have no love for my people,” Jed went on after a few seconds, “but I can speak to them. I have traveled these lands before, and I have no quarrel with them, nor they with me.”

Jed seemed like he was just going to stand there and wait for them to approach, so Gideon did the same. “Shouldn‟t we, uh, go up and say howdy?” Jed shrugged, and Gideon grimaced at the back of his head. Now wasn‟t the best time for the man to go mute on him. For the moment, he kept his mouth shut and watched the new Indians approach. They were dressed similar to Jed, in native buckskin, white folks‟ shirts, and leather boots, and they all wore their hair in long braids with feathers caught in the weave. The Shoshone slowed as they came near, the four younger ones fanning out around the older man when he stopped about fifteen feet away. The oldest wore a headdress that reminded Gideon of one that Harold Crowe wore for performances, and Gideon couldn‟t help but smile. One of the younger braves glared at him, and he worked to wipe the smile off his face right quick. It was then that Gideon realized that he might be the one to cause the problem here, him and his white skin. Jed handed his rifle back to Gideon and held up one hand, indicating for Gideon to stay still while Jed stepped forward to greet the locals. Jed stood still before them, straight and proud, his pack on his back and his hands forward and spread open. Jed was the one who spoke first, his words sounding a little like the ones from his chants— but only a little. He spoke slowly, as if the words were difficult for him, and his eyes never left the older man. The older man replied in the same language and without nearly so much difficulty as Jed seemed to have, and Gideon watched them all intently, curious as hell about what they were saying but smart enough to keep his damned mouth shut. After a couple of minutes, one of the younger braves broke out of the loose half-circle and walked up to Gideon with his hand out. Gideon thought at first it was for a shake, like most folks greeted one another, but when he extended his free hand, the brave frowned at him and reached right past it, grabbing the barrel of Jed‟s rifle. “Hey, now!” Gideon protested, tightening his grip on the stock. “Let loose your hold, Gideon,” Jed snapped impatiently, and Gideon reluctantly did as he was told. He tightened his mouth to keep

any words from slipping out when the Indian took his pistol out of its holster, too, examining it carefully before returning to his party. The old man looked at Gideon square on for the first time, and said something to him in that new language they were all using. Gideon looked to Jed, hoping for a translation but at this point, not expecting it. Jed didn‟t even look back, but he did say in English, “He does not speak the tongue.” The old man‟s English was heavily accented, but Gideon still understood when he said, “He speaks for you,” and waved his hand toward Jed. Gideon crossed his arms over his chest, clutching tight to Star‟s reins and forcing down his frustration about the brave stealing their guns. “Yeah,” he agreed. He pointed to the man who‟d taken their weapons. “That‟s my Colt, and the rifle‟s Jed‟s,” he said. “I didn‟t expect no thieving.” “Shut up, Gideon!” Jed snapped at him, harder than any words he‟d ever said. To the old man he added, “He does not understand that you are holding them in trust.” “You have entered our lands,” the old man said. “You may not hunt here. We have precious little game for our own people.” “Oh.” Gideon stepped forward enough to get a glimpse of Jed‟s profile, loosening the reins and letting the leather slide through his fingers so Star wouldn‟t follow. Jed‟s face looked just about chiseled in stone. “Sorry about the misunderstanding,” he said to the Indian holding their weapons. “You could‟ve just told us. We ain‟t gonna disrespect your rules.” The brave holding the guns frowned at him. “White men say that often. Then they graze their cattle on our lands, kill our grasses, and try to settle within our borders.” Gideon nodded, warming to the subject because he‟d heard Harold tell stories like it many a night, to folks interested in listening before the shows. “I‟ve heard that happens a lot, yeah. A friend I work with—he‟s one of quite a few Indians I know—he says lots of us white folk are pains in your sides, so I can‟t blame ya for being suspicious.

But some folks like me, we just want to get along. I could tell you stories….” Jed had turned at some point during his speech to stare at him, mouth agape, and when Gideon noticed he trailed off. “What?” The younger Indians said something to each other in their own language, and Jed turned back to follow the conversation. His face softened into a brief grin, and he nodded. “He does have the fox spirit in him, and he has many stories.” In the other tongue he added something that made all five of the new Indians chuckle. Gideon thought about frowning at Jed, who was clearly making fun at his expense, but he shrugged instead. Men who were laughing weren‟t usually men who were readying for a fight, so he uncrossed his arms and extended his free hand. “Y‟all shake?” The older man stepped forward and gripped his hand firmly, just like a white man would, and while Gideon sorely wanted his Colt back, he figured he‟d see it before they moved on or Jed would have made more noise about it. This was the first time on the whole trip that Gideon had been glad all his guns were in a trunk and waiting for him with Bill‟s show. The old man didn‟t let go of his hand. “You will not hunt here. You will not fight here. You will bring no harm to our people. You agree?” Gideon shrugged. “Sure.” The old man looked toward Jed again, who shrugged, too, and let go of Gideon‟s hand. “We are returning to our camp,” the old man said, looking back and up, toward the sun. “We will travel together for now.” It wasn‟t a suggestion, Gideon realized as the braves moved to flank him and Star. The Shoshone leader nodded to Jed, who fell into step beside him as they led the procession. To Gideon‟s left, the guy with their guns nodded to Gideon, and Gideon nodded back and tried a smile. The four younger braves veered off to a stand of stubby trees to pick up carcasses they‟d clearly hidden when they‟d seen him and Jed coming: two mule deer, each with its legs tied to a carrying pole, long, flat ears still just dragging the ground after each pair of hunters had hoisted their pole to their shoulders.

They walked an hour or more at a pace that made Gideon and Star sweat, but the Indians seemed to have no trouble, not even the ones carrying the loads. Jed stepped in to take one end of a pole, freeing up the brave who carried their guns. There was no conversation—or nothing that Gideon would call conversation. Every so often, the old man would say something, and Jed would answer, or the younger men would exchange a word or two, but no one really talked—not even when Gideon tried asking questions. All he got for his efforts were annoyed frowns from the Shoshone and a hushed, “Walk now, talk later,” from Jed. So he spent the walk trying not to think about what the Shoshone wanted and trying not to watch Jed‟s butt and trying not to let himself get so damned bored he‟d start an argument just for the hell of it. He hadn‟t thought much before about how his idle chat entertained him as much as his listeners. After a time he felt his tension ease a little and realized he‟d started humming like Jed often did. He wasn‟t using any words—he didn‟t know how to say spit in Sioux—but the rhythms came to him easily after all these days and nights with Jed. The braves looked at him now with more curiosity than suspicion, so he figured he‟d lucked on to something right, and either way, the humming kept him from going stir crazy. Now that he was thinking about it, his mind naturally supplied more familiar songs and he hummed those, too, but quietly. He went through all of “You‟ll Miss Lots of Fun When You‟re Married,” twice, then hummed “I‟ll Take You Home Again, Kathleen” before he jumped around a little through reels and dance songs, which didn‟t seem to impress the Indians nearly so much. But nobody complained, either, and careful observation of Jed revealed no more than the man‟s regular amount of irritation with his white ways, so he figured he was all right. Besides, it was something to do to while away the hard-walking hours. He was halfway through the songs he knew from H.M.S. Pinafore—the little musical troupe that traveled with Bill Tourney‟s show had been performing parts of it for a couple of years now—when they topped a rise, and he caught sight of the camp. For some reason he‟d expected a fire pit and some pulled-up logs, the kind of camp he and Jed had been making every night for almost two weeks now.

He hadn‟t expected a home. Clearly though, that was what this was, a native town tucked up along yet another winding bend in the Snake River. Tall teepees stood in a loose half-circle around what could only be called the public square. Well… public circle. He grinned, amused at his own wit. Permanent buildings ambled away from the teepees, some as familiar to Gideon as any settler‟s cabin. Other buildings looked like workshops, all of them made of wood and earth, and two big barns stood a little away from the rest. Wagons, a few of which looked brand, spanking new, were lined up beside the barn. Ponies dozed in a fenced corral, and Gideon couldn‟t wait to get a look at them. Indian ponies were captured or bred from the wild mustangs that roamed the prairies out here, and he‟d heard tell they were fine horseflesh, some of them. The last thing in the world he wanted to do, though, was gawk like so many paying customers did at Bill Tourney‟s show, eyes wide and mouths open, dumbstruck and looking like ignorant hicks for it. So he set his jaw firmly, concentrating on keeping his teeth together, tugged his hat a little lower down on his head, and shut up with his singing as they all approached the town. A rutted wagon path led up from the south, and when the braves reached it they turned onto it, picking up their pace like horses to stables the closer they got to home. Gideon was jogging along and Star had kicked into a trot by the time the eight of them—well, the seven men plus Star—reached the square. People came out to meet their party, women and kids mostly, and an old man who must be the chief, the way the hunting party collected around him. Lots of words, not in any language he could understand— apparently not in any language Jed did either, because he came back to stand beside Gideon with the one brave who Gideon guessed had been assigned to watch them. After a time, the old man raised a hand, and Jed stepped forward. Gideon was still holding Star, so he figured he could just keep being useful like that and stay out of Jed‟s way until somebody asked him to do something. The chief nodded at Jed and asked something in that tongue both tribes knew. Jed answered it, his voice smooth and low even if he did go slowly with the words. Whatever he said seemed to satisfy the chief, who nodded once more and turned back to the man who had been leading the hunt. Jed came

back to stand beside him while the locals talked on, gesturing to each other and to the deer that the braves had laid down, pointing at the sky and the hills to the east. Gideon wished like hell they‟d talk English, because this was the longest and most animated conversation anybody‟d had around him since—damn, he thought, resisting a low whistle, since Livingston. Gideon looked around the village, silently doing the math. There must be a couple of hundred people here, and most of them looked thin and tired. Five young men sat back, away from the milling crowd, and their hair was all cut short, shorter than Gideon‟s was now. “They get in trouble?” Gideon asked Jed. He pointed to the men with the short hair. They looked sullen enough, maybe hair cutting was some kind of punishment in these here parts. Jed sighed, shook his head, and turned to the brave who still carried their guns. After a brief exchange, Jed went back to using English. “They traded their hair for supplies,” he said flatly. “Those two new wagons, bags of flour for winter. The government….” He sighed again. “Your people, they do not understand. They think if they make us look white and dress white, we will become white.” “Huh.” Gideon had actually seen a lot of pictures, conversion pictures they were called, of Indians who he‟d always thought had taken up the Christian religion, or white society. It hadn‟t occurred to him that the government had been bribing them to do it. “So, what? They‟ll grow their hair back out now?” “Of course,” Jed said, and shot him an annoyed look. “Would you not?” It was Gideon‟s turn to shrug, because while he understood a little more about Indians and their hair than most folks did, he clearly still didn‟t understand enough. “So why did they cut their hair for supplies?” This time, Jed actually turned and looked at him, his eyes wide and his face showing more distress than it had since they‟d met up with the Shoshone. “Look around,” he hissed before drawing a deep breath and schooling his features back to stoniness. But his eyes were still wide and angry, and Gideon felt guilty without knowing why.

So he looked around, paying closer attention than he had before. Thin and tired, he thought again as he looked at the people, but more— thin to the bone, some of them, with the dark circles under their eyes and deep shadows in them. More than tired, they looked exhausted, and weary of the world. He looked closer at their surroundings and saw the way the hide on the teepees was worn and patched, as was the clothing the Indians wore. The buildings were rough and more than a few had holes between the boards that needed filling in, and gaps in the wood itself. “Jed?” he asked in a whisper. “What‟s… why are they so…?” Jed‟s face tightened. “Because they are Indians. Because your people think it is better to confine us to land that is dying, that you have robbed of game and forests and fish, so that we might die as well.” Gideon frowned, looking back at these Shoshone. The chief and the older man who had led the hunting party here were moving away from each other, and the group around them was shifting as well. “His name is Tendoy,” Jed said as the older man came toward them, followed by the braves who had traveled with them earlier and a larger crowd of stone-faced onlookers. Gideon was used to being looked at, so he just smiled and nodded at those people who met his eyes, mostly the women, and waited on Jed to finish filling him in. “Tendoy is honored here. We are his guests. We will be treated well.” Tendoy came close, holding up a hand to Jed. He spoke again in the tongue that Jed understood, and Jed answered. Then Tendoy turned and spoke in a loud voice to the braves who‟d walked them to this village. Jed whispered, “He is telling them that we are to eat well and to sleep on furs as warm as their own. They killed two deer today.” Gideon frowned as he looked at his companion. “They got no call to feed us. Tendy here already told us they didn‟t have enough game on their land for us to be huntin‟ on it.” “„Tendoy‟,” Jed corrected. “It is the way of the Newe, Gideon. If they have welcomed us as guests, then that is how they will treat us.”

“Well, I‟ve got some white ways I‟m pretty fond of, too,” Gideon said stubbornly. “And one of ‟em is not taking from folk who can‟t afford to give it. Hell, Bill Tourney lowers the price on tickets a little when we run across a town that‟s hard up, and he loves money more than he loves his wife.” Jed didn‟t have a chance to answer him, because Tendoy took that moment to call to Jed, drawing him away. Gideon stepped back, rubbing Star‟s neck as she nudged him with her nose looking for treats, but Gideon quieted her with a word while he watched the village folks going about their day. Tanning racks lay on the ground not far from the road they‟d walked in on, but there weren‟t many hides tied to them. An old woman with two little kids, a girl and a boy it looked like, skillfully scraped one hide that they‟d laid out in the sand by the river‟s bank. From this distance he couldn‟t tell what the hide was from, but it sure was bigger than a deer. Still, it was only one. The low building that was clearly a smokehouse, he‟d expect to see sides of carcasses hanging, drying meat to get ready for winter, but to Gideon‟s eye, too many of them hooks were empty. Some of these men had cut their hair for supplies. Gideon felt his mouth tighten, thinking on how important it had been to Jed that somebody carried his hair for him. Whatever barber had cut those braves‟ hair wouldn‟t know nothing about that, would have just swept it out with the rest of the trash at the end of his work day. There must be a couple of hundred people here, but the garden down by the river didn‟t cover more than an acre, and it had damned little in the way of row crops, mostly corn and beans. Mule deer were big enough animals, but them two were going to go fast. He eyed the geese still tied behind his saddle, and hoped Jed wouldn‟t mind. “Star, you be still now,” he said quietly, and dropped her reins to the ground. Sliding a hand over her flank, he reached to untie the cord that they‟d used to tie all three birds‟ necks together from the saddle strings. Tendoy was still walking to Jed, and Gideon thought maybe it wasn‟t proper for him to just go up and interrupt one of the old folks, so he looked for and found the brave who‟d carried his Colt and Jed‟s rifle

on the walk back here. “My name‟s Gideon Makepeace,” he said as he walked up to the brave. “What‟s yours?” The man looked at him for so long, Gideon thought maybe he wasn‟t going to answer. But then he said, “Cowhatocowait.” Gideon wanted to groan. Why didn‟t these folks have white names, too, like Harold Crowe and the other Indians in the show? Hell, maybe they did and just weren‟t inclined to tell him. “Ka-ha-do…” he tried and frowned. “Beg pardon?” That actually brought a smile to the brave‟s face, and he repeated his name, slow and careful: it sounded like Cowhad-to-cowait to him, so he said it back, just to be sure. The brave nodded, then raised his hand, palm to the ground, and waggled it side to side. Gideon grinned, reckoning that “close enough” translated fine for just about every kind of person he‟d ever run across. “We appreciate you having us as company. My folks taught me that we should always have a gift to give when we visit.” He held out the three geese. “Don‟t know if I‟m s‟posed to speak to the older feller over there. It okay if I give ‟em to you? You could maybe pass ‟em on from Jed and me?” Cowhatocowait‟s face softened some, and he nodded. “I do not give them for you. You give.” He pointed to where Jed and the old man stood, so Gideon squared his shoulders and prepared to do this all over again. He came up behind Jed, trying to be quiet enough but failing, because Jed turned to glance at him before he got within ten feet of the pair. “Here,” he said, taking a step past Jed and holding the geese out to Tendoy. The older man drew back, maybe in surprise, and a couple of men from the camp moved fast, coming in close like Gideon was gonna—what, knock him in the head with three dead geese? Still, he held them out and waited, looking away only long enough to check that Star was minding, ground-tied right where he‟d left her. Her ears were swiveled toward the corral and the other horses, but she stayed put, and when he turned his head back around, Tendoy was frowning at the geese, then up to his face.

As Tendoy met his eyes, he said, “I got us five of these Canada geese a few days from here. My family and I, we bring something when we come visiting. Specially seeing as how y‟all weren‟t expecting us, and you‟re still doing us the kindness of letting us stay here tonight.” Tendoy stared at him before his eyes went to the geese. Then, he turned slowly to look at Jed. “You took them,” he said, tilting his head toward the geese. Gideon frowned in confusion until Jed nodded and said, “Gideon did, with my rifle and his bullets. He speaks for us both. There is another, also, cooked. We will share that as well.” Tendoy looked back to Gideon, but Gideon was watching Jed. The corners of those thin lips twitched just a little, not a smile, but the start of one. Gideon smiled for both of them and held the geese closer to Tendoy, glad when the old man took them because they‟d been getting damned heavy. Fifty pounds of gooseflesh wasn‟t as good as a mule deer, but it was more than these people‟d had before, and Gideon was glad to do it—glad Jed was, too, after what Tendoy had said. From there, everything went easier. He and Jed were ushered away, surrounded by men who wanted to share their tobacco and company. Gideon had to explain three times that he needed to take care of his horse before Cowhatocowait understood that he wasn‟t gonna let nobody else do it for him, and had two teenaged girls walk him over to the corral. “Any stallions in there?” he asked, peering around the corral for balls beneath long, bushy tails. He wasn‟t willing to take the chance that she might be amenable to company. The girls frowned at each other and at him, until Cowhatcowait caught up to him, and he could ask again. “Need my mare to be ready to perform when we get to San Francisco. Last thing I need from her right now‟s a foal growing inside her. Just wanted to make sure you didn‟t have any studs mixed in here.” Cowhatcowait smiled and pointed up the river, where a lean-to and a much smaller corral had been built right into the water‟s edge. They didn‟t even have to carry water for the horses kept there. “We have three stallions. But your horse is not in season.”

Gideon shrugged. “I spent the last four months on a breeding farm, and I swear some days it seemed like most of my time was took up keeping the studs away from her, or her away from the studs. I just don‟t want to take any chances.” “She has good lines. Why do you not wish to breed her?” “I work for a wild west show,” Gideon said, wondering if he‟d get invited to tell some of his stories. “I think she‟ll make great foals, too, but she‟s only four years old, and I ain‟t ready to ruin her for show work just yet.” Cowhatcowait shrugged and shook his head. “She is safe here. Kimane and her brother sleep at the lean-to, to care for our stallions. The horses have never escaped before.” Gideon nodded and started pulling Star‟s tack and saddlebags. She‟d had a long day and a fast one, compared to most, so he borrowed a burlap sack and rubbed her down good, smoothing her hair and looking for hot spots from her saddle or the bags, but she was fine. He dug in his carpetbag for a crab apple and held it out, enjoying the feel of the soft hairs and softer lip as she nibbled it out of his palm before, with a scritch for her ears, he set her loose in the corral. “Star is well?” Jed asked him when Cowhatcowait escorted him back to a big fire pit between the teepees. Gideon squeezed Jed‟s shoulder in thanks. It had taken Jed some time to accept just how attached to his horse Gideon was, and more time to appreciate why. “She‟s good. They even let me treat her with some oats, and in the morning I‟ll let her loose with the mares and the geldings to graze. Be a nice break for her, too.” “For her, yes,” Jed said, his face still and sober, but his eyes were dancing. Jed was teasing him again. “Yep. Now me, I‟m itching to be moving, but I suppose I can suffer with the break,” he said, and smiled when Jed shook his head, grinning fondly. “Come to the fire, Gideon.”

Gideon followed Jed to the big fire pit where three circles of logs, like theater seats, surrounded a big open space and the fire in the center. Cowhatcowait directed Gideon into the second row, and Gideon settled down next to Jed. A minute later Tendoy joined them, settling into a squat on Jed‟s other side. Gideon came to appreciate the bonfire as darkness fell and the night cooled down. There was a lot of talk, and some of it was even in English so he could understand it. As the smell of cooking meat started to fill the air, Gideon felt a change in the people around them. Voices rose and there was more laughter. Someone started playing drums, thin hides stretched over wooden frames, and before long a brave in the front circle peeled off his shirt and started dancing. Others followed suit, and soon enough most of the people from the inner circle were doing the same. It wasn‟t dancing as Gideon was accustomed to, not paired-off couples doing reels and twirls around the floor; instead, it was mostly men, stepping to beats of their own, a little like what Harold, Thomas, Aaron and the others did for the paying audiences in Bill Tourney‟s show. They moved in a wide circle around the fire, stomping their feet and clapping their hands, chanting like Jed but louder, their voices and the women‟s in the crowd blending with the rhythm from the drums. This dancing showed him more than anything else just how much of a put-on Harold and his kin did, and how much of their real dances they hid or saved for their special occasions. As the dancing went on, more of the men stripped off their shirts, twirling about with their skin glistening in the glow of firelight. A few went a step farther, dancing only in thongs and moccasins, their legs muscular and defined, sweeping upward to curves of ass and waist that made Gideon have thoughts he knew he ought not to be having right now. He wondered if Jed would take offense that these writhing bodies were affecting him. After a while, as the speed of the music changed, Tendoy leaned toward Jed and said something. Jed frowned, his eyebrows drawing together. He glanced to Gideon then turned back to Tendoy who said something else and smiled. As with Jed, it was a slight shift of the corners of his lips, but his eyes lit with amusement, and Gideon wondered how bad this was going to be.

“Jed?” he murmured, leaning in close to his friend. “Everything all right?” Jed said something else to Tendoy, who nodded, before Jed turned and said just for Gideon, “I have been asked to dance. It is an honor, to share the dancing circle.” Gideon looked to the dancers near them. “They, uh, ain‟t gonna ask me to join in, are they?” he asked. Not that he hadn‟t danced with his Indian friends before, when he‟d been drunk enough. Jed snorted. “No, they will not.” Gideon tilted his head Jed‟s way, examining the way his eyes followed the dancers‟ movements, certain Jed wasn‟t thinking the things Gideon had been a moment ago. “You want to dance?” he asked. Jed shot him an eager look. “It has been five years since I danced with others.” “You should, then,” Gideon urged, grinning despite himself. “I‟m happy to watch.” Jed‟s face hardened like it had when they‟d first met these Shoshone out on the plains. “Do nothing—” He stopped, pursing his lips, then glanced warily around them, “backwards. And stay quiet.” He leaned just a little bit closer and hissed out, “For both our sakes.” Gideon nodded agreement, even though he had to wonder what Jed was so worried about. He didn‟t speak Shoshone, and while the Shoshone spoke English, they didn‟t seem very keen on using the language unless they were talking to him directly. Wasn‟t like he was dumb enough to make eyes at any brave, not even Jed, in company like this. On the other hand, it was hard not to want to start something when he watched Jed move his blanket to a log in the front row and join the circle. The Shoshone were strong dancers, their movements sharp and aggressive, as if they were doing a war dance. But the sounds of drums and the bodies of most of the other dancers seemed to fade away as Jed absorbed more and more of his attention. Jed‟s movements were similar, and his dance was similar, but he used more turns and more circles, his hips and arms weaving patterns in the air. His voice

was hard to hear, but Gideon could imagine it, low and clear, familiar to Gideon‟s very bones. When Jed caught the hands of a brave and a squaw and set them to moving sideways, around the fire, they caught the hands of those next to them, and so on until all of the dancers were joined. The quiet conversations in the audience faded away until all Gideon heard was the crackle of the flames, the beat of the drums, the soft slaps of moccasins on dirt. This went on for some time, and ended as naturally as it had begun, folks simply letting go of each other‟s hands. When no one was holding hands anymore, conversation picked up again in the crowd, and Jed started to weave among them again. He reminded Gideon of an exotic woman who traveled Bill Tourney‟s show. She danced with scarves and veils and chains that she wore at her waist and on her ankles and wrists. The idea of Jed in colored veils, his limbs jingling with chains—well, it didn‟t do nothing for Gideon‟s peace of mind at the moment. Suffice to say, Jed was a sight to watch. He moved faster than the others, dancing between them and around the circle, his head thrown back and his long hair whipping around with his movements where the Shoshones‟ braided hair stayed more still. When Gideon caught sight of his face, it seemed that his eyes were always closed, which Gideon knew couldn‟t be the case—he could have run into the others or stepped into the big fire in the center of the dancing circle. Gideon leaned forward, fascinated, so focused that the voice next to him startled the hell out of him. “He dances as a warrior.” Tendoy had moved in close beside him, settling on the log where Jed had been sitting. Gideon nodded, careful not to reveal what he was thinking. “The gods sent us that dance,” Tendoy said slowly, as if trying to find the words. “We believe it is a way to save ourselves from your people, to bring us back to the old ways. To give us back our lands.”

The sadness in his voice caught Gideon‟s attention, and he turned to look at the older man. “That‟s the Ghost Dance then,” he said, less surprised than he supposed he should have been. Tendoy looked startled for a moment before the lines of his face smoothed to blandness. “The Ghost Dance has been forbidden by your white leaders,” he said, his voice mild. “We would not break your laws.” Gideon looked back to where Jed danced, twirling faster now, his arms outstretched, his leg strong and reliable for him, not bothering him at all. Some of the Shoshone dancers had stepped out of the circle to watch him, and Gideon read the respect on their faces. Outlawed or not, Indians still held to their faith just like white folks held to theirs. Seemed like Jed was made up of his faith. Tendoy said, still very slowly, “It was his people who died at the Knee.” His people. Jed moved to the far side of the fire, his movements partly lost behind the bright blaze. “I don‟t mean no disrespect, but I don‟t know a lot about your people—or any of the tribes, not on their own. I reckon everybody‟s read about Wounded Knee,” Gideon offered, careful now. “But I‟ll bet I don‟t know as much as I should.” It was sort of the truth. Most of his Indian friends were from further north, up in Canada. While he knew that there were a lot of different tribes, he‟d never given much thought to the differences between them, not like he would to, say, the differences between Irish and Italians. Here he was, keeping company with one, and he didn‟t know how to tell him from most of the other Indians he saw. Jed did a series of jumping twirls that had the drummers picking up the pace of the beat, and Gideon found himself clapping along, relieved when all the noise made it too loud for more conversation. The other dancers picked up the beat, too, as it grew into a frenzy of jumps and turns and somersaults in the air that made Gideon think more of circuses he‟d seen than of Indian ghosts. When Jed came out of a jump and fell to the ground, Gideon jerked forward, but Tendoy‟s hand on his arm stopped him. “He has died. He will rise anew,” he said, like he was quoting scripture. Gideon

watched as a few other braves leapt and fell to the ground, as other dancers moved over and around their panting bodies, and the rest of the tribe got to its feet, clapping to the beat of the drums until the dancers still standing came slowly to a halt. They were breathing fast and hard, shiny with sweat, and dark circles stained the shirts of the ones still wearing them. Jed pushed off the ground and shook his head back, his hair wild, his eagle feather still drifting in the air behind him, and strands of hair were stuck to his damp forehead. But his eyes were bright and as alive as Gideon had ever seen them—more alive than in the heat of their passion. This was something Jed loved, this dancing, but Gideon guessed Jed loved even more what it was supposed to do for his people. Any tensions left between the Shoshone and Jed ended with the dance. The food was ready, and they sat to eat, sharing a meal of goose and fresh venison, some kind of root vegetable that reminded him of turnips, and flat bread still warm from oven or stone. As Jed settled back down beside him, Gideon grinned. “If I‟d known you could do that,” he whispered, “I‟d have asked you to dance for me.” Jed grinned back and said just for Gideon, “You have. It‟s just a different sort of dance.” Gideon watched Jed eat, watched the grease from the venison shine on his fingers and wanted to lick it off them. He turned his eyes away before he made trouble. When the stories started, it was easier to ignore the lure of Jed beside him. An old woman who called herself Anzee-chee began the storytelling session, telling of a massacre some thirty years past that had taken too many of their people, and of a medicine man who‟d seen it in a dream and saved those families who‟d left before the military arrived from Fort Douglas. She told it in English, no doubt for his sake, and the way she spoke the words sounded like poetry to Gideon. He had the sense that if she repeated the tale, every word would be the same. He knew from Harold Crowe and his brother Luke that lots of tribes kept their history this way, since none of them were much for writing or book making.

“Jedediah says you tell many stories,” Tendoy said, turning to Gideon. He raised his voice, gaining the attention of all the folks settled around the fire. “Gideon will tell a story of his people‟s now.” Gideon flushed and shot a look to Jed, looking for guidance. He didn‟t think stories about the show were proper, not after the tale the woman had told, and he didn‟t know what these folks would want to hear. Jed nodded to him. “Tell them of how your mother met your father, and how she came to travel with him,” Jed suggested, and Gideon smiled. Jed loved that story, and it was a nice tale indeed. Might lift some spirits around here. So he launched into it, telling about his grandmother the schoolteacher, how his ma said it had been love at first sight with his daddy. “Well, love at first sight or not, it took the whole week the show was in town for it to be love of any other kind,” he said, infusing his voice with the dark humor of it. “A few weeks after the show moved on, Mama turned up expecting with me, and she wrote a letter to my pa to see if it was really love or if she‟d just been, well, a stop on the road.” Gideon smiled fondly at the memory, because he‟d had his share of stops on the road and not one of ‟em would he have been overly happy to hear that kind of news from. “My daddy‟s name is Robert Makepeace, and he wired her money to come and catch up with him the same day he got her letter. I was born in New Orleans, where the show hunkers down for the winters, and I‟ve worked with it since I was a kid. Still do,” he said. “But the show is not near here,” one of the braves said, a question in his voice. “Gideon was hired by a horse breeder in Montana,” Jed put in, “to help school some of his animals. Gideon saved my life there, and now I am returning him to his family and his work.” Some folks nodded, and plenty of the women were smiling. True love was always a happy tale to tell. When a brave stood up to tell a story, his was happier, too, and right funny, about his first hunt and how bad he‟d been at it, scaring the game away with his noise and his questions until his older brother had threatened to leave him under a tree until the hunt was finished. And so the night went on, long after the food was finished and the fires burned low. Some folks had already

gone to bed. Gideon could see shadows through the teepee walls, the movement reminding him of puppet shows the actors‟ troupe put on for little kids. Cowhatocowait asked him for one more story, so he told one about a dancing bear who had been a part of the sideshow for a couple of years, right up until it had tried to dance with the wife of the mayor in a small town in Virginia. The bear had been more interested in the smell of the flowers in the woman‟s hat than in the woman herself, but she hadn‟t understood that one bit, and the bear had scared ten years off her. They‟d managed to get everybody settled down with the bear unhurt, but the bear and his keeper had parted company with the troupe soon after. The moon, just a few days past new, had set long ago, and most of the fires were banked for the night. Tendoy held up his hands after Gideon finished. “Rest. We must hunt at dawn,” Tendoy said, his voice stern as he looked at the braves who were still chuckling at Gideon‟s story. Gideon said, “I‟m right tired myself. Jed and I still need to find a place to bed down anyway—” “You will stay here,” Tendoy said, gesturing to a nearby teepee. “The furs are thick and soft.” Gideon glanced to Jed, unsure of how to answer. “We do not wish to take someone else‟s furs,” Jed said in English, but he added to it in whatever that language was that both tribes seemed able to speak. Tendoy frowned, but he looked a little relieved, too. He answered Jed in that foreign tongue then clapped his hands together, pointing to a little crowd of young men. They rose and moved away to do his bidding, and Tendoy pushed himself to his feet. It was the signal for everyone else, and Gideon was thankful; his legs were aching from sitting Indian-style for so long. “We will share Tendoy‟s teepee,” Jed explained. “It is an honor to share his home.”

Gideon nodded his thanks to Tendoy. “Them geese Jed found,” Gideon said, “they weren‟t but three days east of here. Big flock of ‟em, maybe Jed can tell you how to find ‟em?” “Three days is off our land,” Tendoy said, a clear rebuke. Jed leaned forward, said, “It is less than two days, without a white man and his horse. The land between here and that lake is unsettled. We saw no cattle or whites to the west of it. You could send only two braves, and they could bring back much meat and feathers.” Tendoy looked thoughtful, and nodded slowly. “Tell Cowhatocowait of your route. But tomorrow. Now, we sleep.” Tomorrow, Gideon promised his unhappy dick, they‟d be moving on. But it was going to be a rough night of not thinking about Jed and his dancing. It wasn‟t though; once he settled in on the bed of furs a hell of a lot softer than his bedroll on the ground, Jed stretched out past him, their heads close together like they slept most nights, he found that he couldn‟t stay awake. As Tendoy had promised, the next morning started early, and Gideon was not happy to be rousted before the sun was even up. It didn‟t take him long to figure out that he was in a whole village of people like Jed, who were up and moving before first light, and he hoped they wouldn‟t be staying in too many more Indian camps along the way. He‟d got to liking his extra time to rest while Jed got up and roamed for meat or wild vegetables, and he realized now just how much Jed was spoiling him. The thought made him grin, and he vowed to do more of his fair share on the road ahead. Star was just as uninterested in moving around at this time of the day as he was, but she gave in more quickly when Jed murmured things to her in his own language and stroked her long neck and behind her ears. Gideon was almost jealous of the horse, and he said as much, drawing a quick grin from his companion. They set out with Tendoy and his braves, walking as the sun rose. There was as little talk as there had been the day before, but there was less tension. When Gideon started humming, one of the braves grinned

at him, and before too long, he was teaching “Never Mind the Why and Wherefore” to the whole party. They stopped at a stream to refill canteens, and Tendoy gave them back their guns. “We will part here,” he said, speaking English. “Kill no more than you must to eat for a day. Go in peace.” Gideon took his gun from the man then held out his hand in offering. “Thanks for the hospitality,” he said. Tendoy nodded, clasping Gideon‟s hand like a white man would. He turned to Jed and spoke in Shoshone, which Jed answered in kind. They spoke longer, and when they parted, they grasped each others‟ wrists in the Indian way. Tendoy stepped back, and Jed turned to Gideon. “Come on,” he said quietly, leading the way. The Shoshone waited as they walked away, and even though he could feel their eyes on his back, Gideon didn‟t even think to feel threatened. After a while he looked back, and they were gone. He could barely see them moving off to the north, vague shadows amid the dry grass. After a while Gideon asked, “Why did they give us back our guns? I thought they didn‟t want us killing anything they might need.” Jed smiled a little. “You shared food with them, and you shared your life with them. You showed respect for their ways.” “How about you, Jed?” Gideon asked. “Did I show respect for your ways?” Jed slowed his pace a little, looking at Gideon. For some reason, this answer was suddenly very important, and Gideon stood a little straighter. There was plenty he could have done wrong, from plain old ignorance— “Yes, Gideon,” Jed said slowly. “You did. I thank you.” Gideon felt his chest puff up with pleasure at that answer, and turned his face away to hide his smile, so Jed wouldn‟t tease him about it. Much as he usually enjoyed Jed‟s teasing, this thing with the

Shoshone had been… well, it had become important to him that he‟d done good by Jed. They moved on until almost nightfall, when Jed found a stream and strolled along until they found a good spot to camp near it. While Gideon set a small fire, working with Jed‟s flint which he was learning to master, Jed put their bedrolls side by side. Before the sun was down, Jed stripped out of his clothes and washed, then he wrapped himself in his blanket and his thong, so Gideon braved the icy water and did the same but pulled most of his clothes back on after. It was getting damned cold tonight. They ate dried meat and flat bread that Tendoy‟s people had packed for them, and while it seemed like they were talking a lot, neither of them actually said much with their mouths. Before they‟d finished their meal and packed the rest away for tomorrow, Gideon was half-hard, just from the looks he and Jed kept sharing.

AFTER the sun set, the gray dusk gave way to a blue-black night in the east and warm, darkening hues to the west; the crescent moon hung low in the sky. Jed stood and dropped the blanket onto the rest of his bedroll. With his eyes holding Gideon‟s, he moved in a slow circle around the bedrolls, swirling and stomping in a rhythm that needed no music, even though he did almost-silently chant the familiar sounds Gideon had come to know. Gideon slapped his thigh like a drum, keeping time with his partner, and it wasn‟t long before Jed was covered in a sheen of sweat that caught the firelight so that he seemed to shimmer as he moved. Jed‟s hair was blacker than the night, and it, too, caught what little light there was, shining as it swung and flew with a life of its own. Part of Gideon had a life of its own, too, and it rose hard and proud as Jed danced, his naked skin inviting, his lithe body showing all its finest qualities to Gideon‟s hungry eyes. The thong covered Jed‟s good parts, but it also defined the hard muscles of his ass, drawing Gideon‟s eyes every time Jed turned or twisted. On his fourth or fifth pass around their bedrolls—Gideon had lost count long ago—he came close enough for Gideon to reach and run his

fingers down the back of one leg. He didn‟t intend to throw Jed offbalance, just to draw him closer, but Jed was shifting his weight from one leg to the other, and Gideon‟s pull on it threw him off his center. Jed fell. Fortunately, he was small enough that he didn‟t hurt Gideon too much when he landed squarely on him. Unfortunately, it ended Jed‟s dance—and took Gideon‟s breath. Jed lay on top of Gideon, trying to get his arms under him. Gideon caught his hips, hands slipping on all that sweaty, bare skin, and did his best to lift a little, helping Jed put some space between them until Jed got his arms pushed out in front of him. His hair hung down like a dark waterfall on all sides of Gideon‟s face and over the top of his head so that Gideon couldn‟t really see anything: no stars, no moon or sky, not even the details of Jed‟s face just a few inches above his. All he could do was feel: the hard dirt beneath his bedroll and the hard, warm planes of Jed‟s body pressed against him. He could smell the rich, earthy smell of Jed, and the mint on his breath, could hear the sound of Jed‟s panting loud in his ears as Jed quickly caught his breath. Gideon decided that now was a great time to take it away again, with a long, deep kiss that ended with his tongue in Jed‟s mouth and his hands struggling to untie the damp leather tie of the thong. For his part, Jed had positioned his knees on either side of Gideon, and Gideon could feel the press of Jed‟s erection as it ground against his own. He twisted, levering himself and then rolling so that Jed was under him. The thong came loose, and Jed grunted as they rolled and twisted against each other. When Jed rose above him, Jed managed to get his hands between them and tug Gideon‟s pants open, and for a while, Gideon did no thinking at all. But when Jed slid down, urging Gideon on top, Gideon‟s body cooled just enough for his brain to start working again. He looked down into Jed‟s eyes, starlight reflecting in the wide pupils. “This means a lot to me,” he said, searching for words that he‟d never used before, not with a man or a woman. Words he wasn‟t sure he should be using now, not just because Jed was a man, but because the words seemed so important. Binding. San Francisco wasn‟t so far away anymore, and

they‟d be parting ways there. Words, meaningful words… there seemed no point to it, except for the need inside Gideon to say them. “I know,” Jed answered, his voice low. “I feel for you, too.” Gideon smiled down at him, the words warming parts of him that weren‟t connected to his balls. He leaned down and kissed Jed, slow and warm, letting the heat of passion cool just enough to give them both back a little control. “Want to give you something,” he said as he drew back. And Gideon did; he wanted to give Jed his heart, but that seemed big, too big, and the other offer was easier to face. “Want to let you get inside me this time.” Jed blinked and his breath caught, a choked sound in his throat. His hands tightened their grip on Gideon‟s shoulders, his fingers hooked into the fabric of Gideon‟s shirt. “What?” he asked, his voice passion-thick and rough with desire that was familiar now, and so damned welcome. Gideon swallowed, but he didn‟t back down on his offer. He didn‟t even want to. “You been the one doing the most giving,” he said. “Reckon I‟d like to be giving you some back.” Jed held his gaze for several seconds before taking a slow breath. “I—I can‟t. Not now. I am too impatient. You would have pain.” Gideon kissed him on the lips, a soft touch. “I ain‟t afraid of you,” he said as he pulled back. “And I ain‟t a virgin—I‟ve had men before.” Jed smiled, his teeth white in the darkness. “I‟m glad to hear it,” he said. “But for now, I like it better the way we have been doing it.” To emphasize his words, he spread his legs and hooked his ankles behind Gideon‟s knees. “I want you again tonight.” The relief Gideon had felt earlier came back, but this time, he chided himself for it. Jed had every right to ask for and get the same thing he offered to Gideon so willingly. And Gideon wanted to give it. But as Jed arched his back, pressing his hips up against Gideon, Gideon was glad that the hot column of flesh bruising his belly wasn‟t going into him tonight. He always had been called selfish, and he wouldn‟t deny that. Not about this. Jed really was impatient, and he barely gave Gideon time to find some grease to ease the way. By the time they were joined, he was

pushing up against Gideon, using his legs to lever his groin up off the bedroll, rubbing himself against Gideon‟s belly as much as he could while Gideon pushed deeper and deeper inside him. As much as Gideon liked talking, there just wasn‟t anything that needed saying when they were like this. He resisted the pull of Jed‟s ankles, resisted his own wants enough to get inside slow, until he was buried to the balls. Once he was seated he rested on his elbows and looked down at Jed‟s face, trying to make out what few details he could from the flickering firelight, but he had the feeling he‟d get his ass kicked— literally—if he didn‟t hurry up and get moving. Still he waited, until Jed‟s tight-clenched eyes opened, and Jed looked up at him, until Jed‟s urgent movements slowed just a little, and he thought Jed might be frowning at him. “What?” Jed asked him. “Nothin‟,” Gideon replied, and pulled almost all the way out of the tight-clenching flesh, then thrust back in. The movement made Jed‟s head push back into the ground and his neck arch, made Jed‟s chest push up a little as he responded to the pleasure Gideon could give him. Gideon got plenty of pleasure in return, the passage slick and tight, warm and so smooth, and he gave up trying to control this thing and just rode it, letting Jed lead as much as he could, even though he knew it was going to make him spill sooner than he wanted, make this end sooner than he wanted it to. He focused as much as he could on Jed, to try and take his mind off that tight, slick glove around his shaft, but it was a lost cause, and soon enough, he was grunting, sure the end was coming at him like a freight train, keeping the pace Jed seemed to crave with an effort that made the urgent pleasure surging in him all the better for not letting it get rushed any more than it already was. “Jed, I‟m—” he panted. The strangest thing happened: Jed, whose arms had been around his waist, moved one down to his ass and poked a finger into him, dry, startling him a little, and moved the other up to his arm, gripping his biceps hard. Jed didn‟t even say anything, and Gideon just kept thrusting, getting maybe a few more in than he would have otherwise,

from that little pain of Jed‟s finger in him and the other pain of Jed‟s fingers so tight they might leave bruises on his upper arm. He thought of them marks there, and felt how each thrust forward tightened his hole around Jed‟s slim finger, and when he came, he felt like his body was getting shaken apart. Every piece of it felt like it was coming: his ass where Jed‟s finger barely moved, his balls, his buried, overwhelmed cock, his belly, his throat where some kind of sound wanted to climb out, his clenched teeth, his arm where Jed‟s fingers branded him. Hell, it felt like the roots of his hair were quaking and shaking right along with the rest of him. He panted and shook, and Jed just lay there, legs gripping around the backs of Gideon‟s thighs, and when Gideon could, when the pleasure waned a little, and he had some kind of control over his body again, he hunched back just a little to make a space between their bellies. He didn‟t pull out of Jed‟s ass—he wasn‟t dumb about things like this—he just made enough room to reach between them, using the arm Jed didn‟t have that death grip on, grabbed up Jed‟s hard, hard cock, and stripped it fast, three times, four, five—the come slammed through Jed just like it had Gideon, the muscles of his ass clamping so tight ‟round Gideon‟s sensitized cock that it almost hurt, his body arching and rolling and making this ride as rough and wild as any spirited bronc could, but so much better. So damned much better. Slowly, Jed‟s grip on his arm loosened, and slower still Jed‟s arched body relaxed back onto their bedrolls. “Ahh,” he said, a damned noncommittal sound for all the pleasure Gideon knew they‟d each just had. It made him smile, though, and after a second he slid his hand down Jed‟s arm, encouraging him to ease his finger out. He used the same hand to reach even more awkwardly behind himself and unhook Jed‟s ankles from around each other, and only then did he pull out of Jed. The sound, soft and wet, sent a last lurch of pleasure through his groin, and he smiled some more as he finally rolled to one side of Jed and stared happily up at the blanket of stars. “One day,” Gideon said, “you‟re gonna fuck me like that.” The silence stretched on for a couple of minutes, broken only by their calming breaths, the crackle of the small fire, and the sounds of

night critters—crickets mostly, and mice or rabbits or gophers rustling the dry grass around them. Jed‟s hand bumped Gideon‟s hip and felt around for his hand, clasping it tight. “One day,” Jed agreed. Gideon figured he could die right now, and he‟d be satisfied with his life, short as it had been so far. He didn‟t have to look at Jed to strengthen that feeling. He wasn‟t sure this feeling could get any stronger, this satisfaction that reached far past his loins, up to his heart and his head and into his soul. For the first time this trip, he decided that California, and San Francisco, weren‟t nearly far enough away.

Chapter 6

THE next two weeks flew by and so did the landscape as they left the northern edges of the Great Plains far behind. Somewhere along the way they‟d crossed the Continental Divide, and Gideon thought he could tell by the different climates out here that they were in the Pacific region now, where the weather was influenced more by the great ocean than by the Great Plains. They passed through Owhyee and didn‟t spot another living soul until they reached Winnemucca, past mining towns big and small until they reached what a woman in dungarees told Gideon was the Humboldt River. “You ain‟t far from home, are you, ma‟am?” he asked. She rode astride, which plenty of women did out where city folk weren‟t around to judge ‟em. In this part of the country, the cities weren‟t much to speak of anyway. Her hand dropped to the rifle that hung from a strap on her saddle‟s pommel. “Don‟t matter to you how near or far I am,” she said, frowning. Gideon chuckled, trying to be polite about it. “We‟re just headed west, thought if you wanted some company we could move along at a pace for a time, if we‟re going in the same direction.” “We ain‟t,” she said, but the words were gentler now. She was moving west, her horse‟s gait enough slower than Star‟s that Gideon realized again just how much Jed had managed to push the pace for them. A wide track peeled off by a creek, a shallow tributary to this pretty, meandering river. “Our family‟s place is up that way. Good day to you, boys,” she said, and reined aside.

“See, Jed?” Gideon whispered before she‟d gotten too far away. “Another decent enough white.” “I believe that many white people are decent, Gideon. Some, much more than that,” he said, and the sideways glance he slanted made Gideon‟s mouth stretch into a wide grin. “It is the whites who are not that trouble me and my kind. There are many of those, too.” Gideon couldn‟t hardly argue, so he didn‟t. Instead he struck up a conversation even Jed seemed willing to warm to, about their first gals: first time seeing a woman naked, first fucks—first kisses, which Gideon already knew was his. What they liked and disliked about women carried them the whole day and blended seamlessly into what they liked and disliked about men. Here, Gideon was more hesitant about spelling things out. It still seemed strange, having a man he was comfortable enough to talk to about the subject. He‟d bedded—or at least been blown by—enough men, it oughtn‟t to feel strange talking about it. But Gideon realized there‟d only been one boy, back when he was barely a teenager, he‟d felt close enough to want to ask, and even to want to explain how strange and scary and rich all this lust for men felt. So they shared some silences, too, with just the clomp of Star‟s hooves, shifting stones, rushing water, and the wildlife that thrived along this river‟s edge. They shared each other, every night. Some mornings now, too, when Gideon could interest Jed in the notion. The big mining towns, they gave wide, wide berths. They steered clear enough of Rose Creek and Tungsten, Mill City and Rye Patch, towns that were marked more by the smoke from the smelting plants and the track that crisscrossed the land, rail lines that brought in coal and timber, food and equipment, and hauled out ore. After he and Jed passed a big, beautiful blue lake, some of the land they crossed was dry enough that it barely supported crickets and scorpions, much less sheep or cattle. Dry salt flats caught sunlight like mirrors, making his eyes squint and his skin tan darker. Jed‟s, too, he thought, which surprised him. For some reason he‟d thought Jed‟s skin was as dark as it could get the day they‟d met in Livingston.

Worthless land made for lonely land, which suited Gideon just fine. Jed, too, by the look of him. They spent their nights on shared bedrolls, sometimes with a fire and sometimes without, sometimes dressing after their loving and sometimes just rolled close together, skin on skin, sure they were far enough off the paths of any but the most determined or desperate trappers that the risk of getting run across was small. Or maybe they just didn‟t care. Gideon was sure that would be him doing the not-caring, that Jed looked out for them always, and he was glad Jed knew this wild land well enough to know when they could afford the pleasure of sleeping naked together. Some days were hard walking, and some days Star slowed them down when they went too long between finding rivers or streams and thirst bothered her. Gideon worried about that a little, but Jed seemed to feel it without Gideon having to say, or recognize it in Star‟s plodding steps, because soon enough he‟d find sign of a spring or a creek, even just a burble of water coming up from the ground to make a pool plenty big for refilling canteens and letting Star drink her fill. He‟d thought he‟d gotten to know Jed well enough from nursing him through that time of infection and fever, but he‟d learned so much more of the man on the trail: his strengths in the wild, his way with hunting and foraging and caring for Star. He had such quiet ways, but sometimes, something would drive him to talk, to share a story of his own. The Shoshone had respected him and how he looked in that dance… he knew his own body well, and he had learned Gideon‟s plenty fast. Sometimes—not often, but sometimes—they‟d stop on the trail when they ran across water, and if the weather was nice and there were trees or shrubs along the bank to keep them from being visible through a spyglass, Jed would just drop to his knees, or into that familiar native squat right in front of him, open his pants, and suck him dryer than the salty ground they trekked over. He almost never let Gideon pay him back, not in the middle of the day like that. But sometimes, less often, if Gideon woke when Jed roused himself, Jed would let him suck him before they started their day. Those mornings were Gideon‟s favorites, and he thought Jed walked with a smoother, lazier gait when he‟d allowed Gideon to tend to him.

It was on a sunny afternoon after one of their more pleasurable mornings that Gideon was reminded that not everything was as tame out here as it seemed. They‟d stopped at a trickle of water that might, in a few months when the weather turned and snow was falling on the mountain tops, be called a creek, but for now it was just a faint line of water running along the ground. Star sucked it in as best she could, and Gideon was standing with her, his back to the sun, when something niggled at the pit of his belly. He turned, looking for Jed, who he found on his knees nearby, his pack on the ground in front of him, but his head turned so that he was staring at something in the scrub. Maybe it was his unnatural stillness. While Gideon was now accustomed to his friend‟s taciturn nature and his spare and necessary movements, Jed was so still that Gideon wasn‟t certain he was even breathing. Or it could have been the strange sound he heard, one that had slowly crept into his awareness over the past few seconds. It was low and fast, like the buzzing of a nest of bees, but more distinct, and it didn‟t take his brain but a second to identify the noise. He stepped away from Star, taking two steps toward Jed. Jed didn‟t move, but he said in a hiss, “Gideon, don‟t—” Gideon ignored him, drawing his pistol unthinkingly as he saw the threat: coiled in the faint shade of the scrub bush was a snake, its tail shaking its bone rattles, its head raised on a long arc of body. It hissed at the same time that Jed did, and drew back, ready to strike. Gideon didn‟t give much thought to firing, save that Jed was damned close to his line. Not too close for comfort, though, not with his shooting skills. Gideon blinked, giving himself a few seconds to look around in the aftermath, searching for any other signs of danger. The snake lay several feet away, its long body uncoiled now, blown backward by the impact of the bullet that had shattered its head. The tail still rattled as the body twitched, but the sound was less ominous now. “You all right?” he asked as he walked over and nudged the severed snakehead away with his boot. There was still enough venom in that mouth to do either one of them in, and he wasn‟t going to risk

one of them stepping on it. Jed‟s silence drew his head around in worry. “Jed?” Jed pushed to his feet, moving stiffly, and his voice was also different, dull and a bit breathless. He swallowed before he spoke. “The snake spirit—” “Was too close to my Indian spirit,” Gideon cut in, annoyed. Jed was staring at the snake, his eyes wide and his face pale. But he nodded. “Yes, it was too close. I—thank you, Gideon.” They stood for a time, just staring at the snake as its death twitches slowly subsided, until Star broke the tension with a whoof and a stomp of one of her hooves as she dug into the small puddle of sandy mud. Gideon looked at her and the strong emotion drained away. What a damned fool way of almost losing Jed, after all the effort he‟d put in to keeping him alive in Livingston. He was still holding his pistol, but the barrel had stopped smoking. Carefully, he slid it back into its holster and stared at his right hand. He‟d always been proud of his skills for the show and for the odd hunting trip, but he‟d never been quite this grateful for them before. He rubbed his hand along the side of his pants to wipe away the sweat. “You are a skilled marksman,” Jed said quietly. He had moved to stand beside Gideon, and he reached out slowly, taking Gideon‟s hand in both of his. He used his fingers to spread Gideon‟s hand open, and rubbed at the palm with his thumb, causing an altogether unseemly reaction to course through Gideon. “I‟ve told you how many stories, and you‟re only now believin‟ me?” he asked, trying to sound aghast. But most folks loved to talk, and very few could have made that shot. “Only now have you given me cause. Again, I owe you my life.” Gideon wanted to gripe about Jed‟s lack of faith in his word, but right then Jed leaned over Gideon‟s hand and even though Gideon had no idea what he was going to do, it had the feel of some sort of promise or obligation that Gideon didn‟t like. He tugged his hand back, catching one of Jed‟s wrists in the process and pulling the smaller man against him. “Weren‟t nothing you wouldn‟t have done for me if the situation

was reversed and you‟d had the shot,” he said gruffly even as he hugged Jed close. “But you‟d probably have done it quieter,” he teased, laughing as much to ease his own tension as to lighten the moment. Jed didn‟t laugh, but Gideon could feel the answering smile where Jed‟s mouth touched his cheek as Jed returned the hug. They stood that way for a while as the fear passed, and their hearts stopped pounding against each other. When Jed finally pushed away, he asked, “Is that what you do in your show? Shooting like that?” Gideon smiled back, squeezing Jed‟s hand before letting him go. “Some of it, yeah. Ma started teaching me to shoot when I was big enough to lift the gun—small ones, at first. She has a Derringer rig that she wears when we travel, and it was the first thing I learned to shoot. I‟m not as good as my sisters, though—the twins are going to be stars in their own right. They can shoot the bee off of a flower and never touch the petals.” Jed‟s face expressed his doubt, so Gideon nodded. “I ain‟t exaggeratin‟, Jed. I don‟t, usually, just so you know. They‟re that good.” Jed nodded and his lips twitched in his almost-smile, but his eyes were serious. “I think your skill with the gun is more than good enough for me,” he said. “Thank you.” Gideon swallowed and nodded. “You can thank me for dinner, too. That there rattler‟s about the best meat we‟ve run across in a couple of days now.” “Thank you for dinner,” Jed said, unaccountably sober and serious. Gideon cleared his throat, uncomfortable with that kind of praise. “I think I‟m rested enough—how ‟bout you? Ready to move on?” Jed did chuckle then, but he didn‟t argue, picking up his pack and the snake‟s long body as Gideon rounded up Star. But as they left the water-hole, Gideon took one more look at the bloody puddle of snakehead, reminding himself to clean his gun when they stopped for the night.

After that day, Gideon was more mindful of the dangers of this untamed land and of the simple pleasures of the trip. He spent a whole lot of time enjoying God‟s country, and Jed‟s chanting, and all the ways they‟d been learning to pleasure each other. His various educations—about Jed and Jed‟s body, about the wild and living easily in it instead of making it a battle between his citified habits and mother nature—took up nearly two weeks and, he guessed, five hundred miles, getting them from the reservation of the Shoshone, through the rest of Idaho, across rocky deserts and salt flats, through wild rivers and peaceful valleys, and almost to Carson City before tension of any kind finally set in between them. Gideon was the one who started it. He wasn‟t sure where the words came from or why they came out the way they did, but as the town grew in the distance, he heard himself ask Jed if he was going to „act civilized and take a bath in hot water and sleep in a real bed.‟ It wasn‟t the question itself, which he could have laughed off as a joke, but the tone of it, which even to his own ears sounded needlessly harsh. Jed slowed his pace and turned to look at Gideon, his features twisted into a frown. “Why are you angry, Gideon?” he asked, the words slow and measured. “Have I done something you dislike?” Gideon felt the heat as his skin flushed. “No,” he said quickly. “I just thought—well, we‟re coming up on Carson City, and I‟d like to stay the night there, maybe get a warm bath.” Jed looked at him, the frown clearing away but leaving his features blank. After a few seconds, he said, “You can do whatever you want.” Gideon drew a deep breath, mulling the words over long enough to realize what he was really asking. “I want you to come with me,” he said. Jed looked away and toward Carson City. “You want me there even though you know I would not be content to linger.” Gideon sighed. “No, of course not. But I think you‟re judging us too hard. I got you taken care of in Livingston, didn‟t I? You think I can‟t do it here?”

Jed didn‟t say anything for a while, and Gideon wondered how much he‟d upset the other man. He also wondered what he was really doing—but he didn‟t have to wonder on that for long. They were getting close to a city, and he wasn‟t lying—he wanted a hot bath and hot food cooked with staples and supplies, salt and flour and biscuits all fluffy, dripping with butter and tart with salt. He wanted to sleep in a damned bed for once and not have Jed look at him like that desire made him weak, because it flat-out didn‟t, no more than Jed‟s ease under the open sky made Jed weak. They were just different—raised different, educated different, and there wasn‟t nothing wrong with that. There shouldn‟t be, anyway. But he wanted Jed with him, too. He wanted Jed with him as much as possible, to store up the memories for the time after they reached San Francisco and went their separate ways. He thought about Jed making this trip back alone, to his more familiar territory in the Dakotas, and knew Jed was fine with his own company, completely competent to handle himself and most things that came his way—hell, Gideon thought, annoyed, he‟d probably get back from San Francisco in half the time it took him to get there, with Gideon and Star dragging him down—as long as he was careful about snakes. Gideon had thought on that watering hole more than once as the days passed, wondering whether that rattler would have struck, if it would have got Jed. As comfortable with nature as Jed was, Jed was no more a part of it than any man, and all it‟d take was a wild pig or a rattler, a scorpion or the wrong kind of spider in his bedroll, to end him. The man darned well ought to learn to appreciate cities and the relative safety of them. Eventually, as the buildings grew more distinct, and the homesteads and fenced cattle pastureland they‟d been passing gave way to smaller farms, then houses with smaller barns and big kitchen gardens, Jed said quietly, “I enjoy our time together. But do you think we would be able to be together in a town? Your people are not tolerant of what we do together, alone, and not just because I am an Indian. We are both men—that might be better with an Indian, a savage,” he said, and there wasn‟t even any twist of irony in his voice, “but it could still mean our deaths if we were found out. Is a hot bath and a bed worth risking our lives to you?”

Gideon looked at him, thinking about his words. “Sure ain‟t,” he answered, letting the annoyance show in his voice. Of course it wasn‟t. “But we camped with them Shoshone, and as far as I know they didn‟t figure nothing out. Did they?” he challenged, and watched Jed closely for deception. Jed cast him a sideways glare. “No, they did not. But then, we only slept. You are telling me you want to lie in a soft bed that you pay for… and only sleep?” Gideon clenched his teeth against his answer, because Jed had him caught out there, six ways from Sunday. Yes, he wanted a soft bed, and he wanted Jed and their hard cocks, right there in it. “All right, I admit it,” he grumbled, lowering his voice. Kids were out working in the kitchen gardens, and while the pair of them walking along didn‟t earn many glances—the acreage still pretty big and the gardens well back from the road to keep from tempting travelers to help themselves to a free snack—being careless was a surer way to make Jed right than anything else could be. “I like the thought of us in a clean bed, soft sheets that smell like soap instead of sweat and horse hair. I like the thought of lying there with you, with a locked door—‟cause whether you like it or not,” he said, poking Jed‟s arm for emphasis, “when we‟re out in the wild without a locked door, that‟s its own kind of chance. It‟s just a risk in your world, where you feel comfortable. Well, Jed, I‟ve lived twenty years in cities and traveling between ‟em.” Here he lowered his voice even further. “And I ain‟t never even got a gal caught out if she was of decent folk, where someone seeing her with a man like me would get her in trouble. I sure as hell ain‟t never got caught with a man, and yeah, I reckon I‟ve had my share of those. Right inside the city limits. Right inside respectable hotels and boarding houses and homes, Jed.” All right, it had only been one home, with that one feller who‟d been a bachelor and had his own place and had clearly been lusting after Gideon during the shows. The guy had come to every performance, hadn‟t missed Gideon even once, and after a couple days‟ careful feeling out of each other, the feller had been sure enough to invite him home “for supper and friendly conversation.” They hadn‟t eaten a bite of food and hadn‟t talked much either. But still, he was trying to make a point here.

“Nothing you can say would ever convince me you feared for your safety in the wild, during our times together,” Jed said, his voice as quiet as it got when he was chanting. “I never did,” he agreed. “Because I trusted you, and trusted that you knew what you were doing.” He let Jed chew on that for a time, as the lots got smaller and the road got wider; soon enough they‟d have to turn off it to skirt north or south of the town center, or this road would take them right into the heart of it. Besides, he really did think Jed might be over-reacting. Jed was right that they‟d need to be careful—very careful. But Gideon knew all about how to do that. “You take a fork in the road, and I‟ll follow you,” he said after a while. “We can skip the city, find us a general store on the edge of town to stock up and move right on through. But it would mean a lot to me, Jed, if we stayed in town. If you stayed with me.” Jed looked at him then sighed. “We need supplies,” he said by way of an answer. “But please, Gideon, remember that many of your people simply do not like my kind. You cannot talk everyone into your way of thinking just by being,” he waved a hand, “charming.” Gideon wanted to crow at that compliment, but he tried hard not to let his victorious smile slip out, because it‟d be a damn shame and just plain wrong to boot, to rub Jed‟s face in the pleasure he took from this little win. Besides the pleasure he hoped they‟d share in creature comforts like baths and somebody else‟s good cooking and clean sheets, he was enjoying this, the winning. Lordy, but he was a selfish git sometimes. “I‟m not looking to change every person in Carson City,” he said. Hell, he even meant it. “I‟m just looking for a place that don‟t mind catering to whites and redskins alike, that‟ll let me buy a bath and a good, hot meal we didn‟t have to cook ourselves and a decent room. My charm and my money can get us that.” The road widened, as he‟d predicted, then it widened some more, just past a turnout for the electric train that clearly brought working folks downtown or on through town to the smelters north of here. He didn‟t reckon folks working the Comstock load up in Nevada‟s

Virginia City would actually live this far off, but you never knew. Management might. Jed veered toward the south side of the street, where the late afternoon sun cast long shadows off the buildings. They were walking against the flow of traffic a little, but it made no nevermind: this time of day, folks bustled every which way. “Need a good livery first,” he said. “Need to get Star put up.” Jed nodded but didn‟t say anything. He did point, half a block later, to a street that went off at an angle, and the thicker smell of manure and hay must mean this was livery row. Or one of them. “There‟s thousands of people live here, Jed—Bill‟s brought the show through here before. It‟s the state capitol you know, and I heard it told that half the silver they pull out of the Comstock lode, up north of here, comes straight here to the U.S. Mint. I‟ll bet one of them silver dollars you showed me in Livingston came from the Carson City mint.” His effort at friendly conversation didn‟t seem to calm Jed any: some days, it didn‟t, so on those days Gideon shut up or talked to his horse. He shut up now and led the way, eying the liveries on this street: it looked like there were five or six to choose from, but it was just as likely that some of them shared the same corral yards. The first would be the most expensive, just because it was nearest the main street into town, but he was looking for the one that was the best kept. He found it in the third, in a dry paddock with good drainage, and straw still scattered around it that was clearly used to soak up horse piss and make it easier on the stable kids to fork out the muck. The building looked sound and recently painted. The doors didn‟t squeak when kids darted in and out, leading horses or their owners around. And the man who ran it had a good look about him, warm eyes and an even-seeming temper. His eyes stayed warm, even after he‟d taken in Gideon‟s companion. “Afternoon,” Gideon said. “Afternoon,” the man replied. “That‟s a right pretty filly you‟ve got there,” he added, which only increased Gideon‟s estimation of the man‟s talent with animals.

Jed didn‟t quite snort behind him, but he did whisper loud enough for only Gideon to hear, “Good businessmen say that if you bring in a twenty-year-old nag.” Gideon shot him a glare but didn‟t say anything. It wouldn‟t help Jed‟s mood any for Gideon to go mouthing off at him around white people. “Thank you for saying so,” he said to the livery man. “We‟re just in town for the night, me and my guide here,” he said, waving his hand back toward Jed. “I‟m angling for a hot meal, a hotter bath, and someplace with two soft beds in a room that won‟t mind him traveling with me.” Better to just lay it all out right now, before he parted with any of his money if local attitudes turned out to be more like Jed expected them to be than Gideon did. “And a comfortable place for my horse. She‟s been traveling pretty hard.” “You c‟n find that here, sure,” the man said, and stepped up to them both. “Name‟s Bob Gray,” he said. “Board and feed are fifty cents, an extra ten for oats at breakfast.” “That‟s right fair,” Gideon said, even though he knew he could probably haggle the man down some. “I‟m Gideon Makepeace, and this here‟s Jedediah Buffalo Bird. He‟s trying to get me to San Francisco.” He scratched Star‟s cheek and considered exactly how far she‟d walked on these shoes. “You got a farrier here? She‟s got a lot of miles on her, could stand to have the shoes checked. Don‟t want to have her throwing one on the trail if we can avoid it.” Bob nodded. “Don‟t know what kind of time he has, but I‟ll check. You want restaurants, bathhouses, and a hotel that won‟t give your guide trouble, just stay east of Curry Street and south of William.” Gideon glanced dubiously around himself. “Where exactly are they?” Bob chuckled. “You walked in on Washington Street, or ran into it off of William, if you came in from the east. Government buildings, the stock exchange and the like, are all on Curry Street, west of here.” He lowered his voice, as if he disapproved. “Folks can be a bit more uppity in that part of town, think they‟re better‟n plenty. Carson Street is about eight blocks thataway. You‟ll have plenty to choose from. Good Chinese food here, too. Just follow your noses, boys, and step in

wherever smells the best. If they got a problem with any color, they‟ll usually have a little sign in their shop windows. But since the mint closed, good business people are aiming to keep their business more than their own bad attitudes.” Gideon liked Bob better all the time, so he set to exchanging news and gossip with him as he pulled Star‟s tack and curried her down. Jed found himself a spot in the shade by the livery, but he stood tall, hands hanging loosely at his sides. As unthreatening a picture as he imagined he could be, Gideon thought, and almost felt bad about convincing Jed to come into town. “Bob?” he asked, keeping his voice low as he moved around Star with the curry comb. “I‟ve had some trouble, some places, ‟cause I‟m traveling with a redskin. He‟s a good man, and a better guide, and I really don‟t want to find more trouble like that here. You sure I won‟t?” Bob glanced over to where Jed stood, and looked himself at the picture Jed made. Jed‟s eyes were hidden by his hat brim even though Gideon knew he was on the alert and would be taking in every movement around him. “I‟m sure,” Bob said, like he meant it. “Most folks are decent here. I‟m still sorry we lost the mint. The Treasury had a whole contingent of US Marshals, kept the peace better than any place I‟ve ever known, and they‟re used to people traveling through. Try the Edmundson Hotel. Tell the proprietor I sent you. She and her husband are Quakers, and just about the most decent folks you could ever run across. She ain‟t a bad cook either,” he said, but then he cleared his throat and grinned a little. “But, uh, hers ain‟t gonna be the best meal in town.” “I‟ve been eating pemmican, wild onions, and pine nuts, Bob,” Gideon replied, laughing. “She‟d have to be a real bad cook to make me want to run back to more of that.” Bob seemed to find that funny enough that he slapped Gideon on the shoulder, startling him. He stepped around as Gideon lifted Star‟s hooves, checking the frog and the growth of the horn over her shoes. He‟d checked her hooves every day, but familiarity meant his eye wasn‟t the best anymore for judging. The farrier would take care of her. Gideon promised to look up the farrier after they got settled in for the evening, and he left Star in Bob‟s care before he gathered Jed up out of the shadows.

As they left, he looked back to see Bob stroking Star‟s neck and his horse nudging at the man‟s shoulder over her stall door. Natural born flirt, his horse. He didn‟t realize he‟d said it out loud until Jed murmured, “Horses learn from their masters.” Gideon rolled his eyes up then over to look at his friend. “If I didn‟t know better, I‟d say you were jealous.” Jed glanced around, and Gideon thought he saw a little color flushing those dark cheeks. Still, Jed answered firmly, “I do not need to be loved by a horse.” Gideon laughed, knowing Jed well enough now to know that the man was intentionally misunderstanding the conversation. It warmed him, that Jed was here with him, and that Jed seemed like he wanted to be, now. The Edmundson Hotel was located off a side street, in a tall building that sat alone. It looked a little worn, definitely needed a new coat of paint, but it was clean and the yard around it was tidy. A large vegetable garden filled most of the backyard, and as they approached, Gideon spotted people working in it, young‟uns from the look of it. Inside was bright and cheerful, made more so by Mrs. Edmundson and her oldest boy, who looked to be in his teens. Mrs. Edmundson couldn‟t be more than forty years old, tall and plump, too, while her boy was as thin as a reed. They did give Jed a second glance, but only that, and when Gideon asked for a room for both of them, there were only a few questions about Jed‟s manners, which Jed answered himself. “I don‟t mind you sleeping on the floor,” Mrs. Edmundson said to Jed, “but if you‟re going to, please don‟t be telling people. It gives my beds a bad name.” “I will sleep in the bed,” Jed said, nodding to her. “If you allow it.” “Of course we allow it,” she said, smiling at him, and Gideon warmed to the woman. “We‟re all God‟s children, aren‟t we? You sleep wherever you wish, Jedediah, just so long as you don‟t let people think it‟s because the beds are too hard.”

Jed blinked, and Gideon smiled, pleased to hear the warmth in her voice. “You get a lot of Indian customers, ma‟am?” Gideon asked. She glanced at him, her smile unwavering. “We do, yes. The Stewart Indian School is down south of here. Lots of families come to visit their children. Some of them, having to travel so far to see to them… anyone loves their children that much is welcome here!” She said it proudly, and Gideon was proud of her. But as he grinned at Jed, he saw the stiffness in his friend‟s body and the strong lines of his face that fairly radiated his tension. Mrs. Edmundson didn‟t notice it, or if she did, she let it pass; as she turned to Gideon, her tone stayed as warm and friendly as it had been so far. “Your room‟s on the second floor, toward the back, room 12. There‟s just the one bed, but it‟s plenty wide for two, especially if you‟ve been on the trail all the way from Livingston! My, I wouldn‟t relish that walk.” “It‟s been a pleasure, really,” Gideon said. “I‟ve seen parts of this country I never had before.” “Young men,” she said with an indulgent smile. “Dinner‟s served at seven. Tonight it‟s pork chops and potatoes, butter peas, biscuits, and gravy. I‟m not as good as some of the places down the block, but you‟re both welcome to partake with us in the dining room.” “We‟ll be there,” Gideon smiled at her. “Now—where‟s the closest bath house?” “There‟s a good place three blocks over—run by some Chinese people, with hot water and clean tubs. There are others a little nicer, maybe, but they‟ll rob you blind.” They followed her directions and found it quick enough. It was a good place, Gideon thought, as he sank into the first hot bath he‟d had in—longer than he cared to remember. The only problem with it was that he was separated from Jed. The main room was sectioned off with curtains and blankets draped over long rope lines. It allowed for privacy, which was probably a good thing most of the time. But Gideon had grown accustomed to watching Jed bathe of an evening, and he sorely missed that view.

He took his time, relaxing languidly in water that came up to his chest, and a gangly Chinese boy kept popping through the curtain with a big kettle to heat it up for him. Gideon decided he was just about in heaven until he realized he was paying extra for every warm-up. Still, it was worth it. He even took the time to shave, appreciating the feel of the blade sliding over the relaxed, warm skin of his cheeks and under his chin, and glad to be rid of a good week‟s beard growth. As he dressed, he wondered where Jed was, if he was still enjoying himself. The thought of it, of Jed in a tub of warm water, his skin slick and shining, his eyes closed in pleasure—Gideon shifted, trying not to think too much about it. He finished up, dried, and dressed before his imagination could get away from him. The simple pleasures of life were often the best ones, and he felt sinfully good to be warm and clean. He stepped outside the bathhouse into the crisp evening air, giving his mind and body a chance to cool off. He‟d expected to be waiting for Jed—and was annoyed to find the other man standing in the shadows of the porch, his long hair damp and drying in the slight breeze that blew in as the sun dropped low in the sky. “You can‟t just relax and soak away the day in a bathtub?” he asked, as annoyed by the idea that Jed had rushed through something as pleasant as a bath as he was relieved that no one was bothering Jed out here on the street. “I was afraid you had drowned,” Jed said as Gideon approached. He stepped forward, the corners of his lips twisting up a little. “I did not want to have to explain to your father how I‟d gotten you across a thousand miles of this country, only to lose you to drowning in a public bathhouse in Carson City, Nevada.” Gideon snorted and patted Jed‟s shoulder, touched by the idea that Jed would have delivered the news and not left his folks to wonder. “My folks would understand that.” Jed looked surprised, even after the stories he‟d heard of Gideon‟s parents, but Gideon had been talking all his life; he knew how to save something for the next show and the next town, and he knew how to keep what ought to be personal and private to himself. It made him

wonder what he might‟ve held back from Jed, what things he‟d want to make sure and tell him, before they hit San Francisco and went their separate ways. They stopped by the livery so Gideon could have a quick chat with the farrier, who assured him that Star‟s shoes were in good shape but she could stand a good trim and cleaning. The farrier agreed to see to Star by the time they‟d finished breakfast tomorrow. That business concluded, Gideon asked, “You ready for that nice woman‟s home cooking?” Without waiting for an answer, he steered Jed by the shoulder just to feel the drying silk of long hair brush against his knuckles, until Jed ducked away from him. “Cheaper than finding another place,” Jed said agreeably. “And perhaps her cooking, from what we‟ve heard of it, will make you appreciate mine more when we return to the trail.” Gideon hoped like hell that Jed was wrong about that. Mostly, Jed was. Mrs. Edmundson‟s cooking wasn‟t the best he‟d ever tasted, but it was familiar and flavorful and used all the things a man just didn‟t pack and carry on the trail: flour, sugar, big pats of butter to melt over hot biscuits, honey dripping off a comb in a jar. The pork chops were a little dry, but they were well salted and well seasoned, and it made Gideon smile to see Jed eating pig now, when a pig had almost done him in. After dinner, they headed out to pick up supplies, partly to get it done and partly because Gideon wanted to move around among people for a bit, get a feel for city life. Mrs. Edmundson had frowned at them as they left, warning them that saloons were trouble waiting to happen, and Gideon promised her that they were good folk and wouldn‟t bring any trouble her way. Sunset was settling in when they found a general store Gideon liked the look of, and they went in and poked around briefly, Gideon counting out his dwindling travel money carefully for more coffee, more bullets, flour and salt—he could make pan bread, as long as they had meat drippings, and Mrs. Edmundson‟s biscuits had made him miss bread on the trail. They still had a few days of wilderness travel left, though the closer they got to California, the more Gideon felt like

dragging his feet. He was going to miss the show if he slowed up too much, and he might anyway. He‟d end up riding hard down the California coast—or getting his money out of the Wells Fargo Bank in San Francisco and finally taking the train—to catch up with his people in Merced, or wherever the show stopped next. “Okay, we‟ve got supplies,” Gideon said, toting the burlap sack. “Now how about a drink?” “A drink?” Gideon pointed toward a saloon where music and light and laughter spilled out the open doors, and grinned. “Yeah, Jed, a drink.” It was here Gideon learned that Jed didn‟t like saloons. Gideon hadn‟t thought much about it. He‟d packed whiskey for cold nights on the trail, and he‟d shared it with Jed. Jed didn‟t drink often nor did he drink much, but he wasn‟t a teetotaler. But when Gideon nudged him and pointed to the saloon that seemed cheerful and not too crowded and was definitely calling to Gideon‟s need for social company, Jed frowned and shook his head. “If that is what you want, I will go back to the room,” he said. “Alcohol and white men are not a good mix for my people.” Gideon stopped in mid-stride and turned to look at his friend. “You stay out of saloons?” he asked. The idea was as foreign to him as church on Sundays. Jed arched one eyebrow and tilted his head, clearly amused. “There are very few of them on reservations,” he answered slowly. “The ones I have been in have been in your towns and cities. They usually lead to trouble of some sort.” He leaned in a little closer. “If you feel the need to find someone to stay with for a while, I can find some way to pass the time.” “Stay with?” Gideon asked. Jed‟s smile broadened even though he didn‟t seem all that amused. “Be with,” he said. “That is what your saloons are for, are they not? To meet people to spend time with? To—lie with?” Understanding was a relief—and a twist in the gut. “You think I want to—didn‟t we just talk about this, before we came into town?”

He didn‟t realize he was speaking so loud until Jed took a step back and looked around, his smile gone. “We spoke of much,” he said, his eyes moving along the street and sidewalk, nodding to people who were looking at them. “We did not speak of saloons.” Gideon sighed. “Jed, saloons are noise and music, maybe a card game, barmaids in frilly dresses.” He waved a hand, trying to explain something that was as obvious to him as the nose on his face. “They‟re people, Jed. Friendly folk looking to pass time in a crowd.” “Yet another reason I don‟t like saloons, probably,” Jed said. But he touched Gideon‟s shoulder. “Go on. Get a drink. Enjoy the people. I will….” Here he looked around again and lowered his voice in a way that made the saloon pale by comparison to what was being offered, “I will wait in the hotel.” Gideon caught his breath again, torn between the two options. Before he could make a decision, a voice called out from behind him. “Hey, are you a cowboy?” He ignored it, until he saw Jed‟s eyebrows arch and his gaze fix past Gideon‟s shoulder. “You, Mister Cowboy!” The voice was decidedly feminine and partly because of that and partly because of the look on Jed‟s face, Gideon turned. She was pretty—long brown hair that was pulled back and up under her hat, but curls fell loosely and unevenly to make a frame for her face. She had big eyes, bigger than Jed‟s, and her lips were full and smiling. She was leaning against the support beam for the roof over the boardwalk, her arm crooked around it so that her lace-gloved hand was above her head and holding her steady. Provocative, and pretty, and staring right at him as if there was no one else around. She smiled at him, blinking slowly. “I‟ve never met a real cowboy before,” she said, her voice warm. “And you even have an Indian friend! Come here and talk to me, tell me all about living out here in the West!” He took two steps before he realized he was moving, and when he stopped, he heard Jed‟s soft chuckle from behind. He looked over his shoulder to see the Indian flash a grin at him before saying, “Pass the time. You know where I will be.”

“Uh….” He watched Jed, still standing there waiting for a reply, then glanced at the pretty girl, torn. Not for the reasons Jed was probably thinking, but still. “Hold up, Jed,” he whispered, and stepped toward the gal. “Guess I‟m a cowboy, ma‟am,” he said, and like he always did, added, “I work in a wild west show, best trick rider and bronco buster you‟ll ever see.” Her smile widened, and so did her eyes. “My brother and I just stopped here from the train. We‟ve been moving so fast since Chicago I feel like I haven‟t got to meet a single regular person.” He grinned wider, entertained. “I ain‟t a regular person, not by far. Ain‟t from around here either, in fact. I been—” “You! What the hell do you think you‟re doing?” One glance at the big eyes and the curly brown hair told Gideon this must be the brother. The gal hadn‟t mentioned he was older, protective, nor big as a tree. “Just answering the young miss‟s question,” he said, aiming for genial. He stuck out his hand. “Name‟s Gideon Makepeace, and I—” Whatever else he might‟ve said got lost when the tree trunk shoved him in the chest, hard enough to push the breath from him and land his back up against the wall of the store. “Hey, now!” he said, holding up his hands. “Weren‟t looking to disrespect the lady or cause no trouble.” But it looked like the brother had his own ways of blowing off steam on a long, boring trip, and Gideon was as good a target for him as he was for the woman. Darn it all. The tree trunk stepped forward, grabbing him by the lapels and shaking him, and Gideon felt his blood come up, ready for a fight. Might even be fun, though Jed would probably have to pick the pieces of him up off the damned ground. “Bobby! Bobby, you quit that this instant!” the gal scolded her brother, but the brother shook him one more time, hard enough to rattle his teeth, so Gideon grabbed back and shoved, and just like that they were flat on the boardwalk and rolling toward its edge. Gideon‟s whole plan became putting the brother on the bottom in the horse manure if they rolled onto the street. The pair of them were grappling way too close to get in any good licks, and suddenly there were hands on them,

Jed‟s and the woman‟s, grabbing them and, Gideon supposed, startling the brother enough to settle him down a mite—or make him afraid a wild punch would land on his sister somewhere. He pushed off to one side and sat up, holding his sister tightly by one arm. “Get away from here, you slick sonofabitch,” the brother said. Gideon, resisting the urge to laugh, jumped to his feet and held his hands up in front of him. “Was just leaving, mister.” Still, he turned and smiled at the sister. “Ma‟am.” He turned on his boot heel and grinned at Jed, who was glaring fiercely at him. “Definitely need that drink now, Jed!” he proclaimed. Jed let them get into the street and a few steps away from the pair before he grumbled, “This is why I do not like cities.” “Hey, at least that didn‟t have nothing to do with you being Indian,” Gideon replied, already laughing it off now that the danger of law getting involved was past and his blood was running high. “There‟s all kinds of ways to enjoy a town, Jed—hell, that there was one of ‟em! Gets the blood pumping, makes you feel alive.” Jed looked at him like he was a lunatic as they continued across the street, but Gideon was damned sure Jed understood what he was saying. Maybe not about a dust-up with a stranger, but he knew of some native things that might compare. “Say you sneak up on a friend or some fella from a neighboring tribe. Say you get close enough to flick his ear. That‟s sort of a game, right? But it‟s a little shaming him, too.” Jed nodded, wary now like the last thing in the world he wanted was for Gideon to prove his point. “Well, that was a little bit like that. Sort of a game, but that fella, he was trying to shame me. I didn‟t mind,” Gideon said, just to be clear, “‟cause I knew he was in the wrong—” “I‟m sure he thought the same of you,” Jed cut in dryly. Gideon shrugged. “Don‟t matter if he did. Or if he did, it just means we both won.” Jed shook his head again, clearly disapproving of the whole idea. “You like danger.”

“No,” Gideon corrected, “I like fun.” He lowered his voice a little and grinned. “Think you know that by now.” They had reached the other side of the street right in front of the saloon while they talked, but Jed still seemed wary. Less condemning, maybe, but still wary. “You should go,” he said, nodding toward the light spilling out of the saloon. “Enjoy the people, Gideon. But please, no more fighting.” He slapped Jed on the back. “Fair enough. I‟ll just have one drink, listen to the music for a bit.” “And I will be at the hotel.” Jed didn‟t say anything seductive or make any promises, but he did look at Gideon for an overly long moment, and Gideon decided that yeah, one drink and a few minutes of noise would be plenty. He licked his lips and smiled, wanted to reach out and touch Jed‟s hair. But he wasn‟t fool enough to do that. “Okay,” he said and hopped onto the boardwalk. The saloon was all he expected of it, noisy and crowded, filled with cigar smoke and the smell of spilled beer, women‟s perfume, hardworking bodies, and money changing hands. Gideon had no interest in gambling. He just sidled up to an empty space at the bar and ordered a whiskey, unsurprised to find it watered down a little. He had some left in his pint bottle in the room; he could sip that if he was of a mind. But right now he just wanted to soak in the crowd, and he started a friendly conversation with a fellow to his left, who‟d come in on the eastbound train from San Francisco. “I‟m headed for San Francisco myself,” he offered. “Need to catch up with Bill Tourney‟s Wild West Show. I work in it, y‟see.” The gentleman‟s eyebrows rose. “Yeah? I saw that show when I was in San Jose last month. Fine. Damned fine.” His lips twisted into a sly smile. “Lots of attractions, if you know what I mean.” Gideon grinned. No doubt the fella had seen his mama in the peep show, if she‟d been one of the women working that night. Sometimes, with strangers, he thought he ought to feel more protective of his ma, knowing as he did that this gent and plenty of others probably polished

their dicks thinking about her. But he‟d grown up around it, and had decided many years ago that if all they did was look and think, then it wasn‟t hurting nobody. His mama least of all. “You tip the ladies‟ show?” he asked, offering a sly smile himself. “They work real hard to make a man smile.” The man was really a gentleman, because he flushed a little at such direct reference. “Ahem.” He gave up the effort as quick as he‟d tried to pull it on, though, sensing a kindred spirit. “Yeah—and worth the dollar, too. Those ladies weren‟t just lovely, but classier than I expected. Warmed me on plenty a night,” he added, a whisper that barely carried above the noise of the crowd. Gideon let his smile broaden, thinking about the dollar tip on top of the dollar entry fee. Good for Belle. It bothered him that the show had been running in San Jose so recently, though. They wouldn‟t have stayed more than a few days there, then they‟d have stopped in Palo Alto and ten days at most in San Francisco. They could tear down and pack out from any stop in a day or two, which meant he‟d need to push harder on the last leg of their journey if he was going to catch them before they moved on. Still, it was nice, familiar, being surrounded by folks he didn‟t know, each and every one of them with their own story to tell if he was of a mind to tease it out of them. He satisfied himself with George Rowland, the gent on his way back to New York after a summer taking in the sights of “this great county,” as Rowland called it. Gideon couldn‟t deny it. He‟d seen more of it this trip than he ever had before, or at least he‟d seen it more intimately. He almost felt like a part of it, and he figured he owed that feeling to Jed. He and George shared smiles and easy conversation as they eyed the pretty bar girls, but once he‟d finished his drink he decided he was past ready for more quiet and intimate company. The urge to be with Jed grew steadily stronger, and thinking of San Francisco made him miss Jed already, so he pushed his empty glass across the bar, said his thanks to George for the company, and darted around the crowd dancing in the middle of the room to get to the door. It was full dark now, but the lights of the saloons and open businesses combined with the scattered streetlights made finding his way easy enough. The night air was crisp and cool, and it cleared his

nose of the smell of smoke and people, though he knew both would probably cling to him. Enough that Jed would notice, anyway. But then, Jed noticed everything about him. He quickened his steps and found his way back to the Edmundson‟s place in good time. The oldest son, Zachariah, was reading his Bible in the receiving room when Gideon walked in. He nodded politely but didn‟t speak, so Gideon did the same. Gideon eased into their room quietly, not believing for a second that Jed was asleep, not with the muted thunk of his boot heels on the carpeted hallway floor, the scrape of the key in the lock, the tiniest creak of the door hinges. But he was happy for Jed to pretend for him, if only so he could look his fill. A lamp burned on the table just inside the door, its wick turned low, and he closed and locked the door, leaving the key in so no one else‟s could do mischief from the other side. Jed had taken off his shirt and stretched out on his back, and his dark skin contrasted with the clean white sheet that was pulled up to his chest. The darker points of his nipples made Gideon lick his lips, and the way that long, black hair spilled out onto the pillow made Gideon want to brush it with his fingers. Jed‟s eyes were closed and his features lax with peacefulness—a sight to behold, Gideon thought fondly, deeply enjoying these few seconds of watching. “You get tired, waiting?” he asked, his voice just barely more than a whisper. It was early enough that guests and the proprietors could still be up, and he didn‟t want to raise Jed‟s worries. His gaze traveled down Jed‟s body, outlined under that white sheet, and paused at the only part of Jed he wanted to raise tonight. It looked like it was well on its way without any help from Gideon. Fingers tightened, crumpling the sheet, and Jed drew in a deep, slow breath before he opened his eyes and stared up at the ceiling. “No. No, I did not.” Gideon eased off his coat, hanging it over the door knob just to be extra careful—he‟d checked the room for peepholes first thing, too, and found none, just a clean room with a wide iron bed, the side table where one of three lamps sat, two chairs, and the vanity. It really was a damned nice room to share, he thought as he hooked his thumbs under

his suspenders and shrugged them off, letting them fall past his hips. “You lie there thinking about what we might get up to? How‟s that bed, anyway?” he asked before Jed could answer the first question. Wasn‟t like Gideon didn‟t know Jed would deny having thought anything at all. “Too soft,” Jed said, a not-quite grumble that made Gideon smile. Jed was used to sleeping on the ground, and from what Mrs. Edmundson had said, it sounded like plenty of Indians opted for the thick rug on the floor over a bed even when they did take a room. Jed rolled onto his side to prop his head on his bent arm, and there was no creaking of springs or bed frame; that was good. That was real good. Jed didn‟t say anything, but he watched, so Gideon took his time stripping down, liking that they had light to see by, liking that Jed‟s eyes on him heated him up almost as well as Jed‟s hands or his mouth or his dancing. By the time he‟d shucked boots and shirt he was already hard, and he unbuttoned his fly quicker than he‟d planned, easing his pants down carefully over his rampant cock and leaving just his cotton drawers. Jed‟s gaze had drifted down to his hands, and Gideon liked how his eyes widened as he tented the cotton, widening further when Gideon undid the buttons and pulled it out. It was all Gideon could do not to palm it right there and then. He wanted… he wanted. He just plain wanted. He took long strides to the bed and reached for the covers, peeling them back, unsurprised to find that Jed still wore his buckskin pants. No way would he have lain there naked and alone in a white woman‟s hotel. Gideon pushed the covers to the foot of the bed and reached for the laces of Jed‟s pants, slowing down now to enjoy the anticipation. “Gideon,” Jed whispered, the word slow and airy. “We must be careful—please.” He shifted, one hand coming to rest on Gideon‟s, pressing it into the bulge under the lacings. “This is not a safe thing—” “We‟ll be quiet,” Gideon whispered in return, even as his fingers kneaded at the hard flesh under leather worn soft as a glove and warm from Jed‟s body. Before Jed could say more, Gideon crawled carefully onto the bed, straddling Jed‟s thighs. “Hell, you‟re quiet as a church mouse,

most times, and me—I know how to behave. I do,” he said, promising with his eyes and hoping he could deliver on it. Jed was stiff at first and frowning up at him, trying to nudge Gideon‟s hand away without making a fight of it, likely more because he feared a fight would be noisy than out of any concern he couldn‟t win it. But Gideon used a couple of tricks he‟d learned over their nights together. He stretched his fingers back and onto the sensitive space above Jed‟s balls, pressing a little, rubbing a lot, and at the same time, he leaned forward and drove his tongue deep into Jed‟s mouth, as far in as he could go. He knew he‟d won when he felt the sigh and heard the faint—and cut off—moan. Easing back to kneel over Jed‟s thighs again, he went back to work on the buckskin‟s leather lacings. “Want to give you what you‟ve been givin‟ me so many nights,” he said, barely more than a whisper and keeping his eyes on his hands. “But I ain‟t so dumb as to think either one of us‟d be any good at staying sensible if we did that.” Once he‟d got the buckskin flaps open he tugged, gentle-like, until Jed lifted his hips, and stopped when he got the leather down around lean thighs. Gideon stretched out on the bed then, right on top of Jed. His cock rubbed against the hard plane of belly, and he rolled his hips, bringing their shafts up against each other, rubbing two sticks together to start a fire. Jed‟s hands grasped his butt, not gentle at all. “You think any of this is sensible?” he breathed, voice quieter now than it was when he chanted, and just as heavy with meaning. Propped against Jed as he was, he turned his hands inward over Jed‟s chest to twist his nipples. “No. No, it ain‟t,” he sighed. “No,” Jed murmured, and Gideon stared at the wet sheen on his lips from where they‟d kissed. “We can do this,” he said, worming his hand between them and taking Gideon‟s cock in it, stroking it slow, “but nothing else. Not here.” This—this was good, Gideon thought vaguely as his pleasure climbed. It was almost more than he‟d expected, anyhow. Jed‟s touch was perfect now, practiced and just tight enough to draw everything up.

“You—” He stopped, swallowed. “You want to go second, then?” Jed‟s frown was brief, but the smile that followed it lingered. “Yes,” he said, clearly glad that Gideon was respecting him even if Gideon wasn‟t exactly understanding. Gideon watched Jed‟s mouth move, though he couldn‟t quite hear the sounds. Yes. You come first. Gideon nodded and held himself over Jed‟s body, looking down between them to admire it, looking further to watch as that dark, skilled hand that knew him so well stripped his shaft, up and down, not too slow and not too fast. Jed liked to pause at the tip and brush the slit with a gentle fingertip, and he did it at the end of almost every stroke. That simple touch undid Gideon tonight as it had so many nights past. He was panting in what seemed like seconds, and his body felt too big for his skin, everything felt so raw and ready. “If I start to make a noise,” he whispered, panting, “I‟ll just kiss you, okay?” he half-asked, half-promised. Jed nodded. His grip tightened, and his other hand wormed between them, taking up Gideon‟s balls and rolling them gently in their sac, sending little sparks of pleasure everywhere. “You may kiss me now, as well,” Jed breathed back. Gideon did, even though Jed was probably teasing him some. He kissed Jed, and he kept on kissing him, open-mouthed and wet and full of tongue and desire and a desperate need for quiet that made his throat ache with it. His body shuddered when the come hit him, and he felt the heat of it pour through his belly and out his shaft, felt the slickness as Jed gathered droplets of come on his fingers and slid them around the crown of Gideon‟s quivering cock. His straight arms trembled, holding his weight up like this, and he knew if he dropped his body down, his come would rub between them, slicking their bellies and Jed‟s hands. So he did, still kissing, trapping Jed‟s hands between them, and let his own hands work their way into the silk of Jed‟s long hair while he panted his pleasure into Jed‟s wet, open mouth. His skin tingled everywhere, toes curling, and his heart pounded like a drum. His pleasure waned by tiny degrees. When he could think clearly again, he thought maybe he‟d lied just a little, because he decided to slide down Jed‟s body and take Jed with his mouth, tasting the

bitterness of his own come from where their cocks had rubbed together, then tasting the thick bittersweet taste of Jed‟s when Jed stiffened, his hips arching up off the mattress, his body curved like a bow while his cock pumped its load down Gideon‟s throat. He might have been panting louder than Jed when he finally lifted his head, and he smiled at the way Jed‟s hands tangled in the bed sheet, twisting it up, holding himself so rigid and silent through his pleasure. He palmed the cock that was slick with spit and smiled up at Jed‟s face even though Jed couldn‟t see. Jed‟s eyes were scrunched shut, his face pinched tight and hard as he gasped, open-mouthed. One last, tender tug up the shaft teased the last drops out of Jed‟s cock, and Gideon bent back down to lick them off the head, taking the time to stare at the pretty little stallion in the lamplight, the way the dark head flared above that tight knot of skin, the way the shaft plumped out just beneath the head, the skin so smooth and gleaming. Jed made a tiny questioning sound after a minute or more had passed, and Gideon let go of the shaft, laying it gently against the smooth belly. “See?” he said when he dragged himself up and dropped heavily beside Jed. “Locked doors and beds can be real good.” Jed tilted his head to the side and blinked at him. “Yes,” he agreed, so simply that Gideon knew he meant it. Gideon sighed, teasing his fingers through Jed‟s hair. The lamplight made the clean strands shine, let him see the tiny tangles his fingers made, and he worked carefully to draw the long strands straight and smooth against the pillow. “I could get used to this,” he sighed. “I—” Jed stopped, frowned, and reached for Gideon‟s wrist, dragging it away from his hair and nudging it gently away from any other part of his body. “I could not,” he said, and looked away. Gideon wondered if Jed meant the bed, the hotel room. But probably, Jed meant him. He pursed his lips and rolled onto his back to tuck himself back into his underdrawers. “You‟d best lace up,” he said. He had to stretch to blow out the lamp, and the acrid smell of smoke in the darkness reminded him more of campfires than the saloon. Behind him, Jed‟s movements made the mattress dip, and when Gideon settled

back down, he dropped his hand to the space between their bodies, his wrist just brushing the supple leather that covered Jed‟s hip. He shouldn‟t have expected this to be perfect, shouldn‟t have expected Jed to say the right words—hell, Gideon wasn‟t even sure what the right words would have been. He knew this Indian didn‟t even like being in a town like this. This wasn‟t no courtship, and it sure as hell wasn‟t no romance. In a couple of weeks, he‟d be headed south with the show and this Indian would be headed… wherever the hell it was he‟d go. With a soft bed underneath him and a familiar body next to him, it took him longer than it ought to have to get to sleep.

Chapter 7

HE WAS up with the sun the next morning, and while he could tell that it surprised Jed, nothing was said about it. They didn‟t talk at all, really, because Jed was keeping to himself and Gideon couldn‟t think of anything to say. It was an uncommon experience for him, and he spent more time talking to the farrier who worked with Star and then to Star, once they were on the road, than he did to Jed. He tried not to dwell on it. He‟d meant what he‟d said, foolish as it had been. If Jed was bothered by it, there was nothing Gideon could do. But as the day wore on, and they got farther from Carson City, the tension eased some. About midafternoon, Jed started his chanting, and Gideon realized that it‟d been a while since he‟d heard it—since the conversation the day before about them going into Carson City, in fact. Maybe it wasn‟t his words that were bothering Jed. Maybe it was being around all the people. Jed was moving them at a fast-enough pace to get them as far away from Carson City as he could, that was for sure. By the time they settled that night, at a mountain stream under a copse of trees, even Jed was dragging. They‟d spent much of the day climbing along the jagged slopes of the eastern Sierras, and while the views were truly breathtaking, the climbing did its own job stealing his breath, and it made his calves ache. Jed moved down stream to fish while Gideon settled his horse and started a fire. As dusk fell, Jed cooked the fish, and Gideon watched him, trying every now and then to

make small talk. Jed answered, his voice low and his answers direct, but it didn‟t go no further than that. When they got ready for bed, Jed placed his blanket on the far side of fire, the first time he‟d put such distance between them. It stung, and Gideon stood there staring for long enough that he knew Jed would fall asleep if he didn‟t say something. He opened his mouth, but he wasn‟t even sure what was wrong. Eventually, he mustered, “What‟d I do to make you mad?” Jed looked up at him, his face as inscrutable as a wooden cigar store Indian‟s. “You did not anger me,” he said quietly. “We should rest. Tomorrow will be another long day—” “You trying to get this over with?” Gideon asked, sliding his hands into his pockets. “That it?” Jed stared at him, blinking slowly before he answered. “We are many days past the schedule I promised you. We have many miles to go, much of it not as easy as the land we have crossed so far. We should rest as we can. We should not be wasting ourselves—” “That what we‟ve been doing?” Gideon asked, taking a step closer. “Wasting ourselves? I didn‟t think so—thought this was something special, especially these last few days.” Jed pushed up and finally stood, rubbing his hands against his thighs. “You said you had been with men before,” he said slowly. “You know the difference between pleasure and love.” Gideon drew a breath but let it out on a long, tired sigh. “Yeah,” he said after a few seconds. “I do.” If he hadn‟t before, he‟d sure learned it on this trip, and he couldn‟t make Jed feel things just by wishing it. Jed nodded once. “We should sleep.” Gideon shrugged and heeled off his boots, burrowing into his bedroll because the altitude made the air chill. They could‟ve solved that problem by sharing blankets, but he wasn‟t going to ask. The damned stubborn Indian held every little thing against him, and next time he was going to make a point of telling him that. If there was one.

After Jed banked the fire for the night, they both lay awake and alone. Gideon knew his companion wasn‟t sleeping, and the fact that he could tell by the way Jed was breathing was an irony that rankled now. He knew Jed well, too well—but not well enough. He was cursing himself for that as the waxing crescent of the moon drifted in its lazy arc high across the sky. The night wandered on and the cold got colder, until a rustle of blankets made him turn his head. Jed stood and walked the short space between them, barefoot but dressed in his pants and shirt. “What‟s wrong?” he asked, pushing up onto his elbows and listening for unwelcome sounds. But Jed dropped to his knees beside Gideon and reached out one hand, two slender fingers pressing against Gideon‟s lips. “„Shh,” Jed said just before he leaned in and replaced his fingers with his lips. It was unexpected, especially after the way Jed had been acting today, and even though he gave in at first, after a while, Gideon pushed against the other man. “Jed,” he murmured, propping Jed over and away. “I think—” “Do not think,” Jed cut him off, firm and hard-voiced. “Just—let me do this.” He shouldn‟t, he knew, and if he‟d had more of this pleasure with other guys, maybe he wouldn‟t have. But he wanted what Jed was offering, wanted the desperate hands pulling at his clothes, the quick oiling of Jed‟s passage and the tight heat that caught his prick and trapped it well and good when Jed settled down on his cock. He wanted the feel of flat chest and hard, tiny nipples under his palms, hard rhythm of their joining, and the barely there sounds of Jed‟s pleasure. He damned sure wanted the weight of Jed‟s cock in his hand. He was rewarded with a soft cry as Jed came, and it was that small sound as much as the ripples of muscles over his own shaft that took him over the edge. They lay like that for a long time, him still buried inside Jed and Jed crouched over him, his hair cool and thick and tickling as it trailed over Gideon‟s shoulder. He‟d slid his arms around Jed‟s waist, holding

him close, and he didn‟t think before pulling Jed even closer. He wanted to say something, but he stopped himself. Jed didn‟t cotton to sweet words, and only a fool or a kid would give up the next few days of this just to be stubborn. Instead, he turned his head and kissed the soft skin of Jed‟s temple, and slid his hands down to that little ass, touching gently where their bodies were still joined. He kept his silence as Jed pulled himself together and drew away, then kept his hands to himself and put himself back together as business-like as he could. It was a relief, though, when after a minute or so, Jed leaned down and kissed him, a quick brush of lips that Gideon was sure had more to do with affection than rut. Lakota didn‟t kiss, Jed had said. But they‟d been doing plenty of kissing. He wondered if this was why they didn‟t.

THE next morning, Jed was as quiet as always, but he didn‟t set the hard pace that he had the day before, which was good for Gideon and better for Star. Her head had been hanging low when they‟d settled into camp last night, and he didn‟t want her coming up lame when they had no time to let her rest. They climbed all day, following a well-rutted road that must‟ve been heavily traveled back in the day before trains. As they crested the pass, they ran across the first traces of snow. Jed was willing to share body heat with him that night, right alongside the heat of desire. They shared blankets the next two nights, too, but Gideon never talked about it, not their coupling and not what he felt for Jed. Instead he fell into his habit of talking about unimportant things, and spent time staring up at the high mountain peaks to the north, so tall and jagged they made the recent days of climbing seem like nothing to complain about. He hadn‟t realized just how spoiled he was until he‟d crested that pass on foot. Trains made for pretty scenery and breathtaking views, and they did all the work for a man. The mountains were beautiful, heavy pine forests rich and green until they petered out at the tree lines, white caps of mountaintops pushing up to the sky, and wide valleys that Jed said native tribes had

lived in since the Earth was born, before white folks had gone and pushed them out. Those stories made him wonder, in quiet moments, why Jed wasn‟t an angrier man than he was. It was late in the day almost four days out of Carson City when they rounded a bend and landed right in the prettiest valley he thought he‟d ever seen. The high mountains were behind them now, so the days felt longer. In the distance, Gideon could make out the smoke of a homestead, and the tilled earth of fields in the middle of the wild grasses they were crossing. They were flush with water and fresh meat from a brace of rabbits they‟d caught the day before, and Jed led them on a path that would take them well away from the house and barn. But as they drew closer to it, Gideon got a sense that something wasn‟t right. He started to say something, but Jed stopped, and his head lifted as he scented the wind. “Trouble,” he said softly, turning in a slow circle to look around. “What kind of trouble?” Gideon asked, touching his pistol. Jed was still searching the horizon but he, too, had reached for his rifle, pulling it from its ties on his pack. “We will see.” He slipped off his pack, looking to Gideon for permission before using the straps to tie it onto Star‟s pommel. Gideon didn‟t have to think twice about it. He followed Jed, kneeing Star into a trot when Jed started to run, fast and low. As they drew closer, Gideon realized what was wrong: the stillness of the place. The farm was big, covering acres, but there weren‟t nobody in the fields, and no one in the yard as they approached the house. The smoke in the air had the acrid smell of tar in it, not the healthy cure of firewood. Jed waved him away, putting distance between them so that they made two targets instead of one. As they passed an old scrubby oak, Gideon dismounted and let go of Star‟s reins, ground tying her beneath it to keep her away from any trouble. It didn‟t occur to Gideon how well he and Jed knew each other until Jed tilted his head, silently ordering Gideon toward the barn while Jed pointed at his own chest and nodded toward the house. He still

couldn‟t see any people about, and that was just wrong, on a farm like this. As Gideon eased in the direction of the barn, he realized the rest of the wrongness: there were no animals. There should have been; the fences looked new and strong, and manure was scattered around the corral, cows and horses, or maybe mules. A place like this would have stock for work and food: horses or oxen to pull a plow, chickens and pigs and cows to feed a family. When he saw the posts and rails scattered on a length of trampled grass, he understood. Someone had run the animals off. Soon after, he saw the chicken coop, one section of it ripped apart. Dead birds lay scattered around, and a quick look told him that it wasn‟t animals that had killed them but man, the only creature to use a gun. He eased up to one side of the barn door, listening for footsteps or voices. Past the silence, all he heard was the beating of his own heart as he peered slowly around one side of the open barn door and into the shadows of the building. Someone had ransacked it, too, scattering tools and boards over the packed earth floor, and hay bales were broken, the hay scattered wastefully about. Looked like it was supposed to be tinder, because a hole at one corner of the barn carried scorched wood, charred planks. Apparently, the fire hadn‟t caught well, or the ones setting it had lost interest. The smell of smoke hung heavy in the air inside, though, acrid and bitter and mixing with the copper tang of blood and death. This was what Jed had smelled, he thought, and it pained him to realize that his friend might know this smell well. Before he could step into the barn, he heard a shrill cry, a woman‟s voice, ragged-edged and screaming, “Put it down right now!” He bolted toward her voice, carrying his Colt low, his finger ready on the trigger. He saw them as he rounded the corner of the barn and caught the path to the house. The woman stood on the porch, holding a rifle in trembling hands while two toddlers clung just as tightly to her skirts. A third child, an older boy, held a pistol but his hands weren‟t trembling. The woman‟s rifle was pointed toward the porch floor, but the boy was still aiming at Jed, even though Jed‟s rifle lay carefully placed on the ground in front of him.

Jed stood a good fifteen feet from the porch, and it was damned unlikely that boy could hit him with a pistol. Still, Gideon lowered his own gun and called out, “Hello the house!” He slowed as soon as the woman‟s rifle came back up, glad when the boy‟s aim shifted, too. “We don‟t mean you no harm, ma‟am,” he called. “We were just passing by, and my friend Jed thought somebody might be in need of help.” Jed didn‟t look at him, his eyes intent on the boy. Of the mother and son, Gideon could tell that the boy was the bigger danger. The kid couldn‟t be more than 10 or 12 years old at most. He needed both hands to hold the gun but he was doing it, the barrel straight and true, his grip tight on the butt. His eyes were flat and angry, not the eyes of a child, but the eyes of someone who‟d seen too much too soon. Gideon swallowed, slowing even more as he approached. When he figured he was a little closer to these folks than Jed was, he stopped altogether. “We were walking that old stage road,” he said, keeping his voice even. “You can see—my horse, Star, she‟s over there,” he pointed over his shoulder without looking. “Jed, here, smelled the smoke from your barn, I reckon, and we thought you might be in need of some help—that‟s all, I swear to you. We ain‟t looking to cause you no more trouble, and if you don‟t want our help, we‟ll be on our way.” The woman drew a deep breath then looked away from Jed and toward Gideon. Her eyes were big and wide, greener than spring grass but puffy from crying. She had dark bruises on her cheeks and lips, and bruises and welts along the parts of her neck that he could see under the high-collared dress she was wearing. Her red hair was pulled back tight, so tight that he thought it might be pinching at her skin, but she didn‟t seem to notice. When she spoke, her voice was thin and raspy, like her throat was raw. “What are you doing out here?” she demanded. Her hands were still shaking harder now, as if talking was taking all her will. “Just passing through,” Gideon said. “On our way to San Francisco. I work in a traveling show—Bill Tourney‟s Wild West,” he dropped in, hoping that maybe she‟d seen it once, “and we‟re on our way to meet back up with it. I was doing some work for a man out in Livingston, Montana, helping him train some horses—that‟s what I do,

train horses. I can get Star up here, let her show you some tricks if you want.” She drew another deep breath, and her eyes drifted off of him and past, looking to Star. “Him, too?” she asked, and Gideon knew she meant Jed. “He‟s getting me there,” he said, glancing to his friend. Jed was still caught in the battle of wills with the boy, who had turned his attention and his gun barrel back Jed‟s way as soon as his mama started talking to Gideon. Gideon didn‟t think either one of them had moved, maybe not even breathed. “He‟s no threat to you, ma‟am, neither one of us is. We came to see if we could help, that‟s all.” “He‟s an Injun,” the boy said, his voice low and tight. “He‟s worse than them that was here.” Gideon opened his mouth to say something, but Jed stopped him—not with a word or a glance, but with a sudden, fast move. In one second he was standing completely still, then in the next, he had dropped and thrown himself into a tuck-and-roll that brought him right up to the porch. He sprang out of the roll and came up under the boy‟s arms as the kid fired a wild shot, knocking the pistol up. The shot was loud and jarring enough that the toddlers screamed, and the woman cried out. Unbalanced as he was by Jed‟s shove, the gun‟s recoil was all it took to land the kid hard on his ass, and the gun fell away and dropped with a loud thunk on the porch wood before it bounced off the edge of the porch and onto the dirt yard. For his part, Jed backed away, breathing fast but not hard. He glanced to the woman, then to Gideon, but he didn‟t say anything. The boy stared at Jed, eyes as green as his mother‟s holding shock and now some fear, too. Well, damn. Gideon swallowed, his insides tight and hard, but his voice was steady as he said, “See? We ain‟t aiming to hurt no one.” The woman slowly lowered her rifle, but Gideon saw more resignation and fear than trust. “Take what you want,” she said, but it was more as a whisper. “Just leave me and my children alone, I‟m begging you.”

Jed spoke then, his voice as low and soothing as when he cared for Star. “We have food,” he said, ignoring her words and everything she might mean by them. “Rabbits. If you cook them, we will bury your dead.” The woman stared at him, then her lips started to tremble and tears leaked from her eyes. She gasped, once, then reached up and swiped at her face with the back of her hand. The boy pushed up to his feet and went to her, putting his arm around her waist. He barely came up to her shoulders, a young‟un, but he did his best to act like a man. “We‟d be obliged,” he said stiffly. He no more trusted Jed than his mama did, but he was making an effort. “We just want to help, ma‟am.” Gideon said the words as kindly as he could and curbed the urge to step up and touch her. Instead, he looked to the small faces that peered at him from behind her, dirty and tear-streaked and just plain-out scared. Gideon gave them both a little smile, then he nodded and stepped back. He took several steps toward Star and away from the house before putting his fingers to his mouth and whistling one quick, sharp sound. Her head came up and her ears swiveled forward, then she broke into a slow trot toward him, Jed‟s pack bouncing on the saddle. Jed also walked over, holding his rifle. His face was grim as he murmured, “Bodies in the back, probably the husband and someone who lived here. They have been dead for days.” Gideon nodded as he untied the rabbits. “All the livestock‟s been run off, from the look of it,” he said quietly. “Chicken coop‟s been torn apart and birds killed. Looks like they tried to burn down the barn.” He pulled the rabbits free and looked to meet Jed‟s gaze. “Who did this?” he asked. “And why?” Jed shook his head. “There are wild animals in every form,” he said, his voice as quiet as his chants but harder than Gideon had ever heard it. “After we bury the dead, we should find out where they went, look for them.” “You think we can take them on?” he asked. “Just the two of us?” He looked around at the destruction then down at the ground where the

grass was trampled. “Look at this mess, Jed. It took a whole lot more than two men to make it.” Jed shrugged, a spare movement, but he didn‟t say anything. Instead, he turned and started away. Gideon looked toward the house to find the woman calmer now and the rifle propped up against the wall near the door. She wiped at her face once more as he approached, but she tried to smile. Her son stood close by her, but now the two younger children were hiding behind him instead of their ma. “I‟m Gideon Makepeace,” Gideon said, stopping at the stone step in front of the porch. “That‟s my friend, Jed,” he nodded toward Jed‟s retreating back. “We caught these yesterday—you cook up what you need for now and save the rest. We can hunt up more.” He didn‟t offer her the end of the rope but lay the rabbits on the porch and turned to follow Jed. “I‟m sorry for the way we welcomed you, Mister Makepeace,” she said, her voice still hoarse. “I‟m Moira Hennessey.” Her breath caught again, but she didn‟t start to cry. “Nice to meet you, ma‟am,” he said with a touch to the brim of his hat. Jed led him around the house to the bodies, which had been dragged away from the porch and laid in the shade of an apple tree. Bloodstains on the porch showed that was where both men had died of gunshot wounds. Gideon hadn‟t had a lot of experience dealing with the dead, so he didn‟t argue much with Jed‟s suggestions, even though he did make Jed switch tools with him from time to time. They only had one shovel that they could find, and a pick with a broken handle. They dug graves under the shade of a clump of oak trees that were set back and away from the house. Jed would have moved them farther away, but Gideon explained that it might be good to have them near—not too near, not a constant reminder, but near enough to visit when the time came. It took them until dusk to dig deep enough to make Jed happy—well, not happy, really. Jed didn‟t understand why anyone would want to rest under the ground, but he didn‟t argue with Gideon about white ways.

He did want the graves deep, though, so that animals wouldn‟t dig them up. Moira‟s oldest boy came out after a time. At first, he stood and watched, wary of Jed, maybe a little angry. But after a time, he picked up a broken board and started helping as he could, clearing dirt away and later, bringing them water from the well. When he felt brave enough, he told them that his name was George, after his pa, and pointed to the corpses not far away. Gideon sent him in before they moved the bodies, even though George wanted to stay. “You go check on your ma,” he said sternly. “We‟ll let you know when it‟s time for the proper burial.” George looked at his father‟s body, and his lips tightened, but he nodded and jogged back to the house. Jed seemed to know more than Gideon thought was right about burials, but Jed had never told those tales. Jed was ready to drop them into the holes, but Gideon caught his wrist and drew him to one side. “Need to talk to Mrs. Hennessey,” he said softly. “She may want to clean them up or something, maybe say a few words.” Jed nodded and said, “Cut their hair.” Gideon didn‟t question it, not right now. He took a deep breath, dreading what he had to do, but before he got near the house, Mrs. Hennessey came out the back door. She had changed into a dark dress that looked like it had hardly ever been worn. Her hair was still pulled back tight, but Gideon could tell that she‟d taken it down and brushed it out, and that she‟d cleaned herself up. She brought with her a bowl of water and a cloth, and she nodded to Gideon, letting him take her by the elbow and help her over the uneven ground. It was one of the saddest, sweetest things Gideon thought he‟d ever witnessed. The sun set behind her as she knelt beside her husband, carefully cleaning away the blood and dirt. She straightened his clothes and finger-combed his hair, and while she made no noise, every now and then, a ray of light would catch her as she turned and Gideon could

see the sparkle of tears on her fine features. She took the same care with the second man, who George had said was his Uncle Tolen, and Gideon wondered if this was her brother or her husband‟s. Either way, he was someone she cared about. Darkness was setting in when she finally stood and turned to them. “I thank you,” she said quietly, “and I‟d ask you, please, to settle them now.” “Of course, ma‟am,” Gideon agreed. “Would you have a lantern?” She did, which helped to speed the work along, but it was still well into night when they finished up. She stood with them the whole time, and George did, too, standing close to his mother and holding tightly to her hand. As they finished up, she said, “There‟s stew on, if you‟d care for it. You‟re welcome to come in.” Gideon glanced to Jed then said, “If it‟s not too much bother, I think we could stand to eat, ma‟am. But if you‟d rather not have us messing up your kitchen at a time like this, we have cold biscuits and jerky. We‟d thank you for the use of your barn, though, and of your well, if it‟s not too much trouble.” She stared at him, her eyes glittering in the lantern light. “I… the children—” “I‟ll take ‟em out some stew, Ma,” George said, “and help ‟em settle in with the horse.” She swallowed and looked at her son. “All right then,” she agreed. Gideon walked them back to the house, as she‟d agreed to let them keep the lantern for the night. The moon wasn‟t much past new, a thin crescent that had been fattening up bit by bit each day. Jed rounded up Star, and he was already at the barn, rubbing her down with a handful of hay in the sliver of moonlight when Gideon made his way back. Star had gotten used to Jed, and for all his comments about the horse, Gideon had the sense that Jed had grown fond of her. He took over and dug out her curry comb, brushing her down while Jed took the lantern into the barn and used some of the hay to set a stall for her. By the time she was settled, George was coming in with

a basket and a second lantern. “Ma sent some bread, too—it‟s a little old, but you can dunk it in the stew, and it‟s good enough.” He set the basket on the ground to one side and held up the lantern, looking around. “There‟s more hay in the loft,” he said, his eyes drawn to the hole in the corner that the fire had caused. “They took most of our cows and the mules,” he said absently. “They stayed here for almost two days after they shot Pa and Uncle Tolen. They ate everything we had in the house, all Ma‟s bread except what she had hid away, all our meat and the vegetables she‟d been storing up for winter. They slept in Pa‟s bed, too, not all at once, but, well….” Gideon swallowed as the boy‟s voice trailed off, understanding more now than he‟d wanted to. Behind him, Jed made a noise, a low, hard sound that Gideon had never heard before. He turned and what he saw so surprised him that he took a step back. Jed‟s face, normally so calm and still, was drawn back in an expression that Gideon could only call fury, his eyes lit with a rage so deep that they seemed to glow. “Jed,” he said, keeping his voice low. “You want something to eat?” Jed‟s head turned so fast that his hair swished, and George jumped a little. That seemed to get Jed‟s attention, and he drew a sharp breath, and Gideon watched him force himself to relax. The light in his eyes, though, was still bright, and he was still looking at Gideon as he asked, “Boy, have you eaten?” George shifted and for a second, Gideon wondered if they‟d have the same problem they‟d had on the porch. But after a space, George said, “Yeah, thanks. Ma had me feed the kids while she was out putting Pa to rights.” He said it so matter-offactly that Gideon‟s heart broke. Jed set to working off some of his anger by setting up a makeshift table using a couple of sawhorses and a board. He pulled over some hay bales, too, that Gideon thought might serve later as a bed for them. He wasn‟t feeling too comfortable about sleeping in the loft, not with the big hole in the corner of the barn and no idea of how much other damage the raiders had done to it.

“You know any of these men?” Gideon asked as he opened up the basket and set to serving stew for himself and Jed. George walked over to the stall, watching Star. “Uncle Tolen told Pa that there was raiders moving around the county—he‟d heard tell of ‟em when he was in Sutter Creek a few weeks back. We didn‟t think much on it, though—didn‟t think we had nothing no one would want.” He turned and looked at Gideon, his hands deep in his pockets. “Ma ain‟t done nothing but cry since they left. She ain‟t been able to leave the house. I was trying to figure how I was going to get to town and get some help, but I didn‟t want to leave Sarah and Lizbeth here alone with Ma.” Gideon nodded. “I‟ll ride in tomorrow,” he said, taking one of the bowls of stew over to a bale and sitting down. “Jed can stay around, make sure there‟s no trouble ‟til I get back with someone. There a marshal around these parts?” “In Sutter Creek,” George said. He turned his head, looking at Jed who was finally settling down. “Where‟d you learn to do that thing you did?” he asked. It didn‟t seem to Gideon that Jed had noticed the boy, but Jed answered calmly, his anger seemingly gone. “Among my people, it is a sort of game we learn as children. But it can be dangerous if you do not know when to do it.” “If I‟d been able to do it,” George started, but Jed held up one hand, cutting him off. “You would have done nothing but give us another grave to dig,” Jed said with a bluntness that unsettled Gideon. But before he could object, Jed went on, his tone softer. “And your mother would have more to mourn. We will try to get back what we can of your lost cattle. You will need them before winter sets in.” George looked back at Star, trying to hide his quivering chin. “That‟d be mighty nice of you.” Jed set about getting his food and didn‟t answer, not that Gideon had expected him to. George stood staring at Star, and after a while, when Gideon‟s hunger had cooled, he called out, “Star? Say howdy.”

Star‟s head came up, and she looked over the stall door at him, then stretched her neck out and bumped her muzzle against George‟s head. George gasped and out of the corner of his eye, Gideon saw Jed shake his head. But a soft smile touched Jed‟s face for a few seconds, and Gideon appreciated it. He had Star do a couple of her easy tricks—pawing the floor to do her counting, holding out her front leg to shake George‟s hand, then dropping to her front knees in a bow. George‟s face lit up in a smile that was the sort a kid should have, and it made Gideon feel better to know he‟d brought some joy to the boy. He was thinking about bringing Star out of her stall and showing off some of her more elaborate poses, when Mrs. Hennessey called from the house. There was enough fear in her voice that Gideon stepped out of the barn, catching up one of the lanterns as he did. “He‟s all right, Mrs. Hennessey!” he called. “I‟ll walk him up to the house.” She had the rifle at her side when they arrived, but it wasn‟t pointed at him, and even in the faint light, he could see the lines of stress and worry on her face. When he got back to the barn, Jed had drawn them a bucket of water, and he was cleaning up. Gideon knew his friend would find the stream tomorrow and get what he considered a proper bath, but for tonight, just getting the dirt and sweat off was enough. They slept close but not together. There was no conversation about it—hell, there was no talk at all. Jed made up a bed from loose hay and Gideon did the same, both of them exhausted from the toll of the day. Gideon went to sleep fast and hard, but he woke before dawn to a cold, dark barn and no Indian friend. It took him a few seconds to remember where he was and what was happening, a few more seconds to consider whether he was annoyed that Jed was up already, then longer still to decide that he had to piss more than sleep. It was too cold to try to make it to the outhouse, which was on the far side of the house, so he walked out to the edge of the fence line, shivering so bad that he almost didn‟t manage to get started. He was halfway through,

too far gone to be able to stop, when he realized that someone was watching him. “Mornin‟,” he said, turning his hips a little further away. “Mornin‟,” the voice said—not Jed‟s, and Gideon jerked so hard he almost splattered his boots. After he swallowed back a couple of real good curses, he turned his head to glare through the dark at George. “You don‟t sneak up on a man when he‟s in the middle of this! What are you doing up, George?” he asked as he shook it off, tucked himself away, and buttoned up. “It‟s too damned cold and dark to be starting the day yet.” George was standing between him and the meadow, outlined by the faint remnants of stars, and Gideon could just barely make out the boy‟s shoulder as it rose in a shrug. “Couldn‟t sleep,” he said, sounding old and tired. Gideon sighed. “How old are you, anyway?” “Eleven.” Damn. He‟d been helping the show when he was that age, already skilled with horses and at taking down and putting up the equipment they used—rope stalls and steel poles, tents for some of the side shows. “Your ma all right?” “Yeah,” George said sadly, then added, “I think, anyway. She was crying in her sleep, some—we all been sleepin‟ in the bed with her, to help her not feel so lonely….” His voice trailed off, and he swallowed, loud enough for Gideon to hear. “You‟re a good boy, George,” Gideon said, meaning it. “Where‟s your Injun friend?” Gideon frowned in the dark. “You been spyin‟, kid?” he demanded, as annoyed as he was afraid of the idea. If they‟d been curled up together… if they‟d been curled up together, George would‟ve thought they were keeping each other warm. “No!” George answered, rancor in his voice. “It‟s our barn! I just—” He stopped. “I wanted to know if y‟all were still here, or if you‟d taken off. Didn‟t see him or you, but when I saw your horse I knew you couldn‟t‟ve gone far.” The admiration in George‟s voice was

familiar to Gideon, so he just nodded and reached a careful hand to George‟s shoulder, using it to steer him back toward the hole in the barn wall. “Let‟s get her fed, then, and find Jed.” With the lantern lit it was easier to know just how gone Jed was: his blanket was rolled up and set beside his pack, and his coat, rifle, and spare ammunition were gone. “Looks like he‟s out to scare up some food for us,” Gideon said, but the knot of worry in his gut didn‟t agree with him. Not at all. “When did them bad men leave, George?” he asked. “Few hours before you and Jed came in,” George said, and his voice was tight in his throat. “You think they got your friend?” “Nah,” Gideon said, forcing more certainty into his voice than he felt. “Jed‟s real smart in the wild.” When George shot him a worried look, he amended, “I guess I worried a little that they‟d run across him out there, but there‟s no call for it. I‟ve seen Jed sneak up on a flock of wild turkeys, get himself within ten feet of ‟em before he even raised his rifle to shoot one. Ain‟t no way a group of men riding loud is going to surprise him.” George chewed on his fat bottom lip for a second before he nodded, clearly wanting to believe, so Gideon clapped his hands together and put on the best performance he ever had, for an audience of one. “So it looks like we‟ve got some work to do! First thing, if you‟ve got any grain around here, I‟d surely like to ask for some for Star. We‟ve been moving fast, and she‟s lost some weight.” She had, and Gideon had hated to see it. She needed to get fed up, and it wasn‟t like these folks had anything left to save feed for. “We did,” George said, trotting up toward the barn‟s front corner, where big wooden boxes with hinged lids were built in against the wall. He opened the first and pitched half-over into it, his feet kicking up in the air and the seat of his britches sticking up over the edge. “Still some here!” he called, his voice muffled from inside the box, and Gideon snickered in spite of himself. Kids. It reminded him of his own younger sisters, who weren‟t much older than George and were just as full of fun. George wriggled up with a scoop full and fished a turned-over bucket from the corner, emptying the scoop into it and diving back in

for another. “I fed the mules and milked the cows with my daddy,” he said. “I c‟n take good care of your horse, Mister Makepeace.” “Thanks, George. And call me Gideon.” George nodded and trotted down the barn hall toward Star‟s stall. Gideon followed him, sure that Star wouldn‟t jump but wanting to watch over her, just in case the kid was boasting. But George slowed as he neared the stall, and called out quietly before he slid over a hay bale and let himself inside. Gideon leaned over the rail and watched. George had some time around animals, enough that he didn‟t turn his back on a horse he didn‟t know, and he raised a hand to shove her head away when she tried to push her muzzle into the pail. He emptied the oats into the trough and trotted back out to fetch up flakes of scattered hay, climbing up the stall‟s boards this time to just dump it over. Gideon chuckled when most of it flitted down onto Star‟s head, but she‟d get to it. “We‟ll get her watered after, and see if we can‟t set the corral to rights.” “Nothing to keep in anymore,” George said forlornly. “You never know, kid,” Gideon replied, trying to be cheerful. “We might scare up your stock yet.” Outside a rooster crowed, and Gideon blinked. “Sounds like they didn‟t take everything,” he said. “Let‟s go see what we can find.” George escorted him up to the house, where lamps burned and a fire was already started in the hearth. The morning chill didn‟t merit the blaze that burned, but a look at Mrs. Hennessey told him she‟d be cold inside for a while, yet. “Mister Makepeace,” she said from the floor. She was on her knees, mopping up something that had spilled on the wood, and a quick glance told Gideon she‟d been working for a while: staples, what was left of them, sat in bags and tins, piled on the kitchen work counter, and the place had the smell of lye to it. It seemed she was determined to scrub the stench of destruction out of her home, and Gideon thought maybe that was a good sign. At the very least, it looked like the worst of the shock had worn off her, and she was making good use of her nervous energy, putting her home back in order. “Ma‟am. George and me heard a rooster crow, reckon it‟s yours?”

“Nobody else for two miles,” she said faintly. “It must be.” “If you‟ve got any corn around, I expect we can coax it back. Maybe gather up them that was killed and dress them out?” “Yes, I… yes.” She blinked still-puffy eyes and rose stiffly to her feet. Gideon felt the rage tighten his skin, thinking on what made her so stiff and sore. The bruises looked worse this morning, but he didn‟t know if that was just the shadows from the fire or that they‟d been that new. If he and Jed had moved any faster, maybe they‟d have chased off the raiders before they could go and do all the damage they‟d done. Or, as Jed had said, maybe there‟d just be more bodies to bury. He didn‟t waste time on might-have-beens. “Jed‟s gone,” he said gently. “I reckon he went hunting, trying to scare up a bit more food for you and your kids. If you‟ve got corn….” “George,” she said firmly, “go out to the coop and see what those demons left behind. Whatever‟s dead but eatable, gather it up and pluck it, you know how to do that.” “Yes‟m,” George said, but he hesitated, shooting a nervous look Gideon‟s way. Gideon just nodded to him, thinking maybe he wanted a man to do the telling, but George frowned and planted his feet more firmly. “I‟ll wait for Mister Makepeace,” he said, and Gideon realized that George didn‟t want a strange man around his ma right now. The thought tightened his throat, and he squatted down so he‟d be on George‟s eye level. “Ain‟t nothing gonna happen to your ma if I can stop it, George,” he said soberly. “Just like, if you could‟ve stopped it, you would‟ve.” George‟s eyes, so like his mother‟s, filled with tears for the first time since Gideon had met the boy. “But I couldn‟t stop ‟em!” The tears overflowed, spilling down his cheeks. “They said they‟d kill Sarah and Lizbeth, and me, too, if I—” Mrs. Hennessey ran to her son and dropped beside him, gathering him up close. “You did just the right thing,” she said, with all the stress and strain and love a mother had to offer. “You stayed alive for me, and you kept the youngsters alive. Boy, if you hadn‟t done that, I‟m sure I‟d have taken that gun of your uncle‟s and followed you, you hear?”

They held each other tightly, and Gideon thought about the sons of bitches who‟d come through this place and left ruin in their wake. If he ever caught up to them, he thought he could kill them. He‟d never killed a man before, but he‟d never had such a good reason to before, either. “Mrs. Hennessey?” he asked, then asked again, until her head swung around toward him. “Your young‟uns usually do the feeding, right?” She nodded, tears streaming down her face, still holding her eldest tightly. “You mind if I let ‟em show me how it goes? Let you and George here have a little time to get things settled?” “That‟s—that—” she closed her eyes and swallowed. “Sarah, Lizbeth,” she called. The two had been blubbering by the work table, holding on to each other, but they both nodded behind her back. “You go with Mister Makepeace, show him how you can feed the chickens by yourselves. George and I‟ll be out in a minute.” “But the chickens are all….” Sarah started, pulling her thumb out of her mouth to do so. “There‟s likely a few left in the trees,” Gideon said, “or the cock wouldn‟t‟ve crowed.” He knew next to nothing about what a rooster would or wouldn‟t do, but he wanted mother and son to have a moment‟s peace. “Let‟s go see if we can tempt them home where they belong.” He herded them out the back door, watching them toddle down the stairs and thinking again of his twin baby sisters, and wondered where they‟d been stuck while those men had been here at the house. Seemed like George was more of a man than he realized yet, if he‟d helped to keep his little sisters alive. He kept up a cheery monologue while they fished corn out of a bin and scattered it around on the ground, making clucking calls, and it seemed like only a few seconds before a banty rooster and four hens came flapping in from the nearby trees to peck at the ground. “There, y‟see?” Gideon said, more pleased by the scene than he ought to be.

“There‟s four hens to be laying eggs for you and a rooster to cook if you need.” The kids just nodded before they turned to start picking up what mess they could. They sealed the corn bin and tugged on the coop‟s wire fencing, and Gideon let them until he heard the door slam back at the house and saw Mrs. Hennessey with her son, standing on the porch. “Think your mama‟s ready to start breakfast?” he asked the kids. They were timid, the pair of them, but they both nodded and looked toward their ma. “Well, go on then, go and find out. I‟ll be right along.” Hand in hand, they trotted on stubby legs toward the house, and Gideon silently cussed Jed out for running off so early and leaving him alone with this. He couldn‟t have waited ‟til dawn to go huntin‟? Gideon followed the kids up and into the house, helped Mrs. Hennessey any way he could. After breakfast—more rabbit stew and biscuits that were damned fine—he took George with him to let Star out to graze, and together they put the chicken coop back in order. “We‟ll work on the corral when Jed gets back,” Gideon promised, but the coop was beat up bad and it took them most of the morning to repair it well enough to keep foxes out. It took them long enough, in fact, that when Jed kept not showing up, Gideon walked around the property, looking for some sign of him. He‟d never tried to hunt the man down before, and he realized now just how damned impossible that would be, if Jed didn‟t want to be followed. There were no tracks, no boot prints he could pick out that seemed fresher than any others— nothing. If Gideon hadn‟t walked with him onto this land last night, he wouldn‟t be able to swear Jed had ever been here at all. By lunchtime, he fetched Star‟s bridle and swung up onto her bareback, to canter her up a grassy rise and search the valley for any sign of Jed. Still nothing. Still no sign. “Come on, Star,” he murmured to her as he reined her around, “let‟s get back.” He didn‟t think Jed would walk off and leave him here, and besides, Jed had left his pack and his blanket. But it confounded him, where Jed might‟ve gotten off to.

George watched him trot back into the yard, and he seemed just as worried. “You think your Injun took off?” he asked, trying to be fierce and cold, and failing miserably. “No, George, I don‟t,” he said, trying to soothe the boy as he slid off Star and gathered her reins. He forced a grin. “Maybe he found us a deer, or something else bigger‟n he is, and it‟s just taking him a while to drag it back to us.” “Maybe those raiders came up on him and killed him, and skinned his scalp off as a prize.” Gideon felt his stomach roil at the thought. “Now, why on earth would folks do something like that?” he chided, resisting a glare. “Your daddy read you too many dime novels?” George‟s face went all soft and lonesome, and his eyes tracked back toward the copse of trees where the fresh graves lay. Gideon wanted to kick himself, but George only said, “Suppose we ought to start in on the corral fence. Since the chickens came back, I‟ve been hoping some of the cows will find their way home, too.” Just like that, Gideon watched the child become a man. He glanced toward the house where Mrs. Hennessey was out back with a washtub and the toddlers. She and her husband had been doing something right, here, something good. And if he didn‟t get a move on, George was going to have the fence fixed by himself, or his hands full of splinters. “Come on, Star,” he whispered, and trotted along beside her to the barn. His folks had always told him that the best way to cure hopelessness was with hard work, and he applied that knowledge now, showing George the finer points of putting a fence back together, and after, he took a careful look at the damage the fire had done to the barn. “It rained last week,” George said. “Soaked the walls over here good.” He pointed toward the ground, where a mud wallow clearly showed how water had collected at this corner. “Guess that saved us the barn.” “Good thing, too,” Gideon said as he stepped inside and took inventory of the scattered tools. If this had gone up, they‟d have lost

more than they could have afforded to replace. “You‟ve got good tools here, things you‟ll need if you and your ma decide to stay here.” “We ain‟t letting nobody run us off our land. Especially not murderers and thieves,” George said, and spat on the ground for emphasis. The words sounded repeated by rote, for all the emotion in them, and Gideon figured it was something his pa or his uncle had said before. Maybe his ma; she had that kind of grit. “Well, then,” he said, focusing on the bright side, “it‟s good you‟ve got all your farming equipment here.” “A plow ain‟t no good without mules to pull it,” George sighed. “Good thing I know where your mules went, then,” Jed said from the hole in the barn wall, scaring ten years off Gideon and making George shriek in fear and spin around. “Damn it, Jed!” Gideon snapped, irate. Jed just looked at them both. “I‟m sorry,” he said. “I should have made a noise.” “Hell, yes, you should have!” Gideon said, rubbing at his chest where his heart pounded under the bones. “You near scared the life out of the boy, here!” “Ahh,” Jed said, mocking him, “the boy.” Jed turned toward George and inclined his head. “George, I thought Gideon was used to how I move. I did not imagine he wouldn‟t know a grown man was walking up behind him.” George glowered fiercely, red-cheeked with anger. “Don‟t you go doin‟ that to my ma, Injun! You hear me?” he hissed. “After them men left, I slipped up to her, and she nearly knocked my head off, I gave her such a fright.” Jed blinked, and all the amusement slid right off his face. “I hear you, George,” he said far more sincerely. “And I am sorry. I was thinking about the cows I found.” He blinked again, and frowned. “I hope they are yours, because I brought them home.”

George‟s eyes lit up, and he bolted out the hole in the barn wall, and Gideon stepped up close enough to Jed to smell him. “You snuck up on us with cows?” A hint of his earlier humor crinkled the corners of Jed‟s eyes. “I left them at the trees and walked in to make sure all was well before revealing them.” “Well,” Gideon grumbled, rubbing at his chest again, “I guess that‟s somethin‟.” He followed George out the hole, thinking they had good, solid doors on this damn barn—doors that didn‟t have a leftover wallow right outside them—with Jed on his heels. “What the hell were you doing gone so long?” he asked, looking around for George and finding him at the edge of the field, leading two milk cows across the grass. The commotion had attracted Mrs. Hennessey‟s attention, and she rounded the barn at a run, carrying the rifle Gideon suspected would become a part of her in the coming months, with the two little‟uns trailing well behind. “What‟s all this then?” she demanded before she caught sight of George and the cows. “Ma!” George called. “The Injun found Daisy and Rose!” “I‟ll be….” she started, then gave Jed a look of sincere gratitude. “I thought they‟d be meat on somebody‟s table for sure, Mister Bird.” “My name is Jedediah,” Jed corrected her, gentle now like he was with Star. “Please call me that.” She nodded. “Jedediah. I can‟t believe you found them.” Jed shrugged and waved a hand. “I just followed the trail. They‟d been abandoned and were grazing a few miles south of here.” Her eyes brimmed with tears, but Gideon was glad to note they looked to be the happier kind. “That means so much to me, Jedediah. We had six more, and my husband sold the butter to restaurants in Sutter Creek. I make real good cheese, and with two back….” She swallowed hard. “You will have more back,” Jed said, with enough certainty that Gideon narrowed his eyes at the man. “I am sure that more were left along the way. Once we notify the sheriff of what has happened here so

he can find those who did this, I will show him the trail. We will bring back what stock we find.” “I—” She stopped and swallowed again. “I thank you, Jedediah.” She turned away, but Gideon could see her throat work as she swallowed, trying to regain her composure. “We‟ve got lunch left over, up at the house. Come and eat when you will,” she said, and hurried off with the youngsters. George seemed glad to be distracted with good news. He fussed over the cows, digging out halters, metal pails, and a milking stool. “Poor things, they ain‟t been milked in days,” he said, and set to work doing just that. Gideon caught Jed‟s eye and jerked his head, asking him to come away from the boy. Jed frowned and shook his head, setting off instead for the house. Gideon left George, curiosity eating at him, because no way in hell had it taken Jed all this time just to find two cows and bring them back, but Jed was on the porch and standing in the kitchen door before Gideon could catch up. Damn, but Jed could move fast when he wanted to. Mrs. Hennessey served them herself and tutted around the kitchen while they ate, making it impossible for Gideon to ask what he wanted, but Jed couldn‟t avoid the conversation all afternoon. As they finished up, George returned with two full pails of milk and more happiness than Gideon had seen all day. “How close is Sutter Creek?” Gideon asked as he cleared his plate and Jed‟s. “Can we make the ride this afternoon?” She turned from the counter where she‟d been washing up, and Gideon saw fear in her eyes. She probably didn‟t want to be left alone out here, and Gideon couldn‟t blame her. Jed spoke first, though, and Gideon wondered at this new side of the man. “I will stay here, if you wish. I think you are safe now, but I can stay behind while Gideon goes into the town.” Something in the way he said it added to Gideon‟s suspicions, but Jed still wouldn‟t look at him.

“Would you mind, Jedediah?” Mrs. Hennessey asked, her hands knotted in a washing cloth. “I‟d feel safer for me and the kids if someone stayed behind.” “I do not mind. Your barn needs repair. I can start that.” “That‟s a great idea, Jed,” he said heartily. “Come on, I‟ll show you what George and I were looking at when you got back.” Jed smirked at him, a look he knew very well after all these weeks. It said, You aren‟t winning anything. “I will stay and help Mrs. Hennessey,” he said. “George, please tell Gideon how to find his way into town.” Damn, Gideon could have used that one himself, if he‟d thought of it. But George was already up and bouncing toward the door. “Come on, it‟s easy. You won‟t be able to miss the old mines, and….” His voice trailed off as he ran out the door, but he stopped on the back step. “Come on, Mister Makepeace! Daylight‟s wastin‟!” So Gideon found himself riding into Sutter Creek alone while Jed and George worked on the fence, and Jed continued to avoid him. It was a nice afternoon, and once he stopped trying to figure Jed out, he let himself enjoy the sunlight and the pretty country and the feel of Star beneath him. Seemed like she was as glad to feel his weight on her back as he was to be off his feet. She stepped lively down a wide, well-maintained road that followed the lazy river, just like George had described. He came upon the town, a once-sizable place that looked like its better days were behind it, almost too quickly, especially for the task at hand, but the news was met with grimness and concern.

“WE ALREADY got people out looking for these men,” Deputy Earl Rock said when Gideon finished his tale. “Didn‟t realize they‟d turned that way, though—damn, the Hennesseys are good people, deserved better than that. You say Moira and the kids are all right?” Gideon hesitated, looking around the small barbershop that the man owned. When he‟d stopped by the sheriff‟s office, the door had been locked and a sign on the door directed him here, to the deputy‟s

business. Three other men listened in, two customers and another barber, and Gideon didn‟t feel comfortable giving out details in front of them. Deputy Rock frowned, then suggested that they step out onto the boardwalk. Despite the people bustling along—it was a busy enough little town—they had more privacy here. And Deputy Rock wasn‟t a stupid man. “Rumor has it that these bastards got no qualms about taking things that ain‟t theirs—livestock, food, coin, women….” He arched an eyebrow and waited. Gideon sighed and nodded. “Reckon that ain‟t a rumor anymore. Mrs. Hennessey and the kids are alive, but I can‟t say they all got out unharmed.” Rock nodded, rubbing at his chin. “Sheriff Bishop and a couple of men have been out riding the past few days, looking for any sign of them. You think Mrs. Hennessey noticed which way those bastards rode out?” “I can do you better‟n that,” Gideon assured the man. “My guide, the man who‟s seen me safely from Livingston, Montana, to here, saw plenty of tracks. I think he thought he could follow their trail without any trouble.” Rock looked excited at the prospect. “He good?” Gideon nodded. “He‟s a Sioux Indian from North Dakota. If there‟s a trail, I‟d bet he can find it.” Rock‟s faced twisted into a dark, hungry smile that under the circumstances, Gideon appreciated. “You staying out at the Hennesseys‟ tonight?” Rock asked. “Reckon so,” he said. “I was going to pick up some supplies and head back out that way. The bastards cleaned her out. Most of her animals are gone, and her larder‟s almost bare. Some of you be out tomorrow?” Rock nodded. “If they‟re all right tonight, yeah. It‟d be easier in the morning. Sheriff Bishop‟s due back tonight. He can put together a posse, head out at first light.” Rock frowned and glanced around

himself. “He ain‟t gonna take this news well. He‟s been friendly with the Hennesseys ever since George was born.” Gideon nodded. “My guide and I didn‟t take it well when we rode into it, Deputy,” he said. “And I‟d never met those folks before.” He was eager to find these bastards and get ‟em locked up. Jed would be, too, no matter how strange he‟d been acting today. Maybe even because of it. “We‟ll be glad to help out.” Rock asked for a few more details before he and Gideon parted company, him back into his shop and Gideon for the general store. His funds were getting shorter, but the Hennesseys had needs right now. He picked up small sacks of flour, sugar, potatoes, and a few of the other things he knew had been taken, as well as bacon and some candy for the kids. Star wasn‟t happy with the extra weight, but her steps were still high as they headed back to the farm at a trot. The sun hung low in the west when he caught sight of a familiar rooftop, and he kneed Star into a canter. The forty extra pounds of supplies were tied down tight, and she tossed her head, unwilling to try and get the bit between her teeth but eager to run. He loosened the reins and leaned forward, letting her go at a full gallop down the welltraveled trail that led up to the Hennessey home. It helped him more than his horse, to feel the freedom of wind on his face. Deputy Rock had promised that the posse would leave at first light, which would put them here early morning, and Gideon knew any man who saw her bruises would think the worst. Would think the truth. Mrs. Hennessey‟s shame would spread through this region like all gossip did, and he wondered if she‟d be more vulnerable for it or better protected by her neighbors. Mrs. Hennessey had set a plate aside for him, fresh stewed chicken and onions that was just about the best thing he‟d ever tasted, more biscuits, and greens that George and Jed had rustled up. “Ma‟am,” Gideon said between mouthfuls, “this is about the best thing I‟ve ever tasted.” She flushed at the compliment and ducked her head, so Gideon stopped talking and kept eating, showing his appreciation by using the last biscuit to sop the plate clean. “There now,” he said, pushing it

forward and dropping a hand to his full belly. “You won‟t even need to wash it.” That got a tiny laugh from her, and Gideon smiled, fond. She‟d pull through. He decided he‟d best tell her the news while her spirits were high. “I met Deputy Rock,” he said. “He said Sheriff Bishop and a couple of men had been out looking for these ba—” A quick look to George made him bite his tongue, “bad men,” he amended. “He said they would round up a posse and come out this way as early as they can start moving in the morning.” Mrs. Hennessey‟s brows tugged down, and she swiped her palms down her apron. “I….” “Mrs. Hennessey? You know Sheriff Bishop and Deputy Rock?” Her lips pursed briefly. “Yes, we do.” “Are they good men?” She sighed and pulled out a chair, dropping heavily into it and crossing her legs. “Yes,” she whispered. “Dale Bishop has a daughter a few years older than George, and Earl could shave my husband better than I ever could….” “Then it‟ll be all right,” Gideon said gently. Jed, shoulder propping up the kitchen wall, watched avidly, almost like he was waiting for Gideon to mess this up. Gideon jerked his head: you do it, then. But Jed looked away, so Gideon forged on. “They know how bad these men are. They‟ll be happy to catch ‟em and see ‟em all hanged. Ain‟t nobody gonna think the worse of you for what‟s happened here.” She looked away from him, and Gideon felt the tension grow in the room. He struggled for something to say, but words failed him now, just at the time he needed them most. “Gideon,” Jed said softly, “go tend your horse.” Gideon frowned at Jed, unsure, but Jed nodded, his eyes soft. “I will help Mrs. Hennessey clear the kitchen.” Gideon was relieved to be away from all this raw emotion, and another small nod from Jed spurred him on. He thanked Mrs.

Hennessey for the meal one last time and slipped out the back to see to Star. He took his time cooling her down after the long ride, talking to her, since he couldn‟t seem to corner Jed for ten damned seconds. Jed had kept himself occupied or surrounded by kids all evening, staying in the house long after Gideon had run out of things to do and gone back after him. Mrs. Hennessey made coffee for him and Jed, and Gideon settled into a chair by the warm hearth, trying not to glare at Jed‟s calm profile while Jed helped Mrs. Hennessey put the two youngest to bed. The thought of that hair scalped and carried around like a trophy sickened him, and he wished to hell George had never put the idea into his head. With the toddlers settled in, Jed told George a story Gideon had never heard him tell, about a young warrior named Brave Bear who was afraid of nothing, not even four ghosts who set out to scare him. Gideon couldn‟t say Jed was a completely different man, but he‟d never seen this side of him before—gentler, softer, slower moving and more tender to everyone and everything around him. When he told of the way Brave Bear bested the ghosts, making bets with them that he won, he used his hands to help draw the pictures, and he laughed, seeming as much a child as George. It seemed damned strange to think that, since he‟d been bedding the man regular for over a month now. Jed saw Mrs. Hennessey to her bedroom door, with George right at her side, promising to let himself out the back and keep an ear out for anything at all. When they finally went to the barn to sleep, Jed stopped Gideon‟s latest effort to get him to talk by putting his tongue in Gideon‟s mouth. Gideon had to admit, it was a damned good way to shut him up. Still, he turned his head to get his mouth out of reach. “Jed!” he hissed. “We can‟t—” “The children are asleep. Mrs. Hennessey will not leave the house. We can.” When he put it that way, especially when his hands were already worming inside Gideon‟s drawers, there wasn‟t much reason to argue. Not that Gideon had the will to try, because this seemed just about the

best way in the world to chase away the heaviness he‟d carried in his heart since they‟d stumbled across this farm. They went about it quick and quiet, a repeat of what they‟d given each other in their only time in a bed, back in Carson City. That seemed like a long time ago, but it was what Gideon thought of: the last minute everything had been just about perfect, before Jed had opened his mouth and dosed him with reality. Before the shit out in the world had run across his path again. It was funny that back then it‟d been Jed who was worried about getting caught. Something had changed between them, or maybe just in Jed. When they finished, Jed eased Gideon‟s cock back into his pants and even buttoned him up with gentle hands. “We should sleep now. Deputy Rock said he would be here early.” “We should talk now,” Gideon tried. “No,” Jed said, his voice quiet and thoughtful, “we should not. This was good. Please, Gideon, take this to your dreams. Save talk for the morning.” Gideon didn‟t like it, but he knew Jed was tired, and he knew Jed was trying to appease him. “Go on,” he sighed. He curled up onto his side, peering through the shadows to try and make out Jed‟s shape as Jed moved back to his blanket. “You ain‟t gonna be gone when I get up, are you?” he asked, frowning. “No,” Jed said. “I will not.” “All right then.”

Chapter 8

MAYBE because he‟d slept so hard the night before, and maybe because he was worried Jed would slip off again, Gideon‟s dreams were restless and dark, and he woke before the sun. Jed was barely stirring, making less noise than Star when she shifted her weight from hoof to hoof. Gideon coughed to clear his throat and pushed up onto an elbow. “Jed?” “It is early yet.” “You‟re up,” Gideon reasoned, and forced himself to throw back his blanket. It was cold as hell this early in the morning, so he dragged on all his clothes and pulled his bedroll up over his shoulders for good measure before following Jed out to the fence for a piss. Night was just barely giving way to morning, the sky bluer than black and all but the brightest stars faded to nothing. He could see the cows standing together at the far side of the corral, and that more than anything else reminded him to wonder what Jed had really been doing out there in the wild, yesterday. He tucked it in and buttoned back up, wishing they had a fire, or coffee, and wondering when Mrs. Hennessey and the kids would rise so he could go fetch some. They went back to the barn, bumbling around in the dark to get Star fed, and Gideon used the lantern to make his way along the path to the creek, rubbing his hands together and beating on his shoulders while she drank her fill. She was a good horse that way, and didn‟t waste his time; mornings like this, he appreciated it especially.

By the time he got back to the barn, the sun was awake behind the mountains, casting a cold white glare over the lower peaks to the east and south. He couldn‟t see it yet, but it gave off plenty of light for him to move by. Jed leaned where Gideon had left him, at the fence just outside the barn. He was staring off toward the rising sun, and Gideon thought he might be chanting, but he couldn‟t hear it. He let Star loose with the cows and strode over to stand by him. “Jed?” he whispered. “You ready to talk now?” “About what?” Jed asked. His voice was so placid and soft, all it made Gideon think of was how hard and angry it had been the day before last. “About why you‟re so peaceable today, for one,” he offered. “Two cows ain‟t gonna do that, not after all we seen here.” Jed looked out on the land and one thin shoulder lifted slightly. “I left after you fell asleep, to find them.” “Find them.” Gideon knew he wasn‟t talking about the cows. “Yes. Do not worry,” he said, still so calm. “I killed them as a white man would. I left no tracks.” Gideon realized his jaw had dropped open because his tongue was getting dry from the chill morning air. “Yeah,” he said blankly. “That was what was worryin‟ me.” Shock and anger made his skin crawl— that Jed had just up and decided that, that Jed could do it, that Jed had done it without his help. He drew a slow breath before he spoke, because under it all, he knew he wasn‟t really surprised. That maybe shocked him more than anything. “Jed,” he finally managed to start, “you can‟t just—” “It is already done,” Jed cut him off, his voice still calm. “Do not waste time trying to change my mind about something that is now in the past.” Gideon swiped a hand over his face and looked around to be sure George hadn‟t slipped up on them before he hissed, “Jed! It ain‟t in the past, there‟s bodies out there now! You got any idea how that‟s gonna look?”

Jed nodded. “It will look like we find the bodies when we go to retrieve her cattle. When we run across them, we will tell your sheriff where they are.” “When we find ‟em….” Gideon‟s throat was dry. He‟d been traveling alone with this fella for weeks, fucking him for most of them, and… and he‟d seen that woman, seen the pain and the shock in her, and the fear and the grief in her kids. Helped bury the bodies of her men. He swallowed and looked out toward the horizon. “How many were there?” he asked. “How many men did you kill?” “I didn‟t kill any men,” Jed said evenly. “I killed animals.” Gideon let that sit a while, long enough that he decided it might even be true. He still wasn‟t sure if it was right—but the thought of Mrs. Hennessey and the young‟uns having to sit through a trial, having to face those bastards and tell what they‟d done…. He sighed. “Long as you‟re sure they won‟t know it was you. And they might guess, just ‟cause there ain‟t no sign.” Jed waved a hand. “Let them guess.” They stood there in silence for a long, long while, long enough that Jed started chanting, low in his throat. “Okay,” Gideon said after a time. The disk of the sun edged over the mountaintops behind Jed, blinding, and the morning was shaping up clean and clear, as if Jed‟s prayers were drawing it forward. “I‟ll let ‟em guess. Long as you tell me why you did it.” He couldn‟t fault Jed for that kind of retribution; men like that were animals, and they deserved to be hunted down like one. The thing that was bothering him most wasn‟t that someone had done that, but that it was Jed. It was nigh on impossible to reconcile the man who could hunt down and kill Lord knew how many men and walk away from it without a scratch with the man he‟d seen in the house last night, laughing and telling stories to the children. Jed‟s head had been hanging low, his chin almost touching his chest, and he swiveled it now to look at Gideon. His hair spilled down, and Gideon watched him reach to pull it back over his shoulder, revealing his face. “Do you know of buffalo birds?” Jed asked. Gideon frowned confusion at him. “I know they were birds that lived on buffaloes‟ backs. I‟ve seen pictures….”

“That is not the only thing they are known for. They travel with the herds, so they do not make their own nests. Instead, they lay their eggs in the nests of other birds, and leave their young for those other birds to raise. That is why I have my name.” His face hardened perceptibly, and he looked right into Gideon‟s eyes, those night-blue eyes spearing Gideon with knowledge and anger. “A white animal, a raider, came to my people‟s reservation. He and his kind did what these men did to Mrs. Hennessey, to many of the women of my mother‟s day. I am his child. My real father—the man who raised me, not the animal who committed that crime against a woman—he claimed me as his own, raised me as his own. But my mother felt shame for a long time, Gideon, even though there was nothing she could have done to stop what happened. No man who forces another is a man. He is an animal.” He turned back to the mountains then, to the sun, closing his eyes and picking up his chant. It was just as soft as it had been, but Gideon heard the strength behind it. Jed had told him it was in thanks, and he wondered now what Jed was being thankful for: finding those men, killing them, or not getting caught himself? Probably some of all of it. “How come white folks are like this?” he asked after a time, and Jed startled him by laughing. “It is not just the whites who are born with the badger spirits. Sometimes, they make great warriors. Sometimes, they hunt their own for sport.” “Well….” Gideon frowned. Somehow, between Harold Crowe and the other Indians in Bill Tourney‟s show, and Jed, he‟d come to think that most of the strange tales about Indians, even Indian mysticism, were just bullshit. “What do you do with ‟em?” “Release them from their enchantments when we can,” Jed said. “Just as I did yesterday.”

THEY came upon the camp filled with dead men not long after they‟d stopped for lunch, a cold meal the posse had packed out from a

restaurant in Sutter Creek. The food turned to stone in Gideon‟s belly as he stared at the bodies, and he put a hand to it to try and quell the nausea. Jedediah Buffalo Bird had done all this. “Looks like they had a fight amongst themselves,” Sheriff Bishop said. He shook his big head, almost unseating his hat, which he‟d pushed all the way back so he could see. He was a tall man, in his forties at least, broad-shouldered and handsome enough with too-long, wavy hair and a week‟s worth of beard growth. When Gideon had asked, Rock had told him Sheriff Bishop had been riding hard lately, trying to find these bastards. Deputy Rock was a chatty man, the kind who made a good barber, and by the time they‟d found this camp, Gideon knew that Bishop had lost his wife to childbirth a few years back. Just like Mrs. Hennessey had said, Bishop had a teenaged daughter, and two more nearer George‟s age. His kids were back in Sutter Creek, caring for the house. “Smells like they had enough to drink.” The smell of alcohol was strong, but not strong enough to mask the smell of blood and death. Gideon looked around, too, keeping his eyes off Jed despite the urge to be his friend‟s shadow out here. “We‟ve eight dead here,” Deputy Rock said, pointing with the barrel of his revolver as he counted. “Most of ‟em look shot.” Five of the other men in the posse moved around the camp, calling out confirmations that there‟d been a lot of drinking—empty liquor bottles littered the place, and some of the dead men held guns in their hands. “This one here got himself knifed,” one of the men called from the far edge of the clearing. He was bent over a body, his hat pushed back like Sheriff Bishop‟s. “Reckon he was trying to get away when the blood loss got to him. Looks like he was headed toward the horses.” They‟d found the horses first, tied out together on long lines of rope by a creek near the clearing. The cows and two mules grazed together in a meadow past the edge of the trees. Jed had tracked them— it looked like he had, anyway—pointing out to Bishop and anyone else who asked how he knew where he was going. The men in the posse had been wary of the Indian at first, but since they were all on horses and

Jed was on foot, and since Jed seemed to know what he was doing, the wariness had slowly given way to respect. They‟d pretty much relegated Jed‟s skin and hair to the land of nobody‟s business, where it belonged, by the time they stumbled into the camp. Gideon hadn‟t once forgotten the things Jed had told him that morning. When he‟d caught the first smell of death, and Jed‟s body had stiffened in front of the group of riders, Gideon had registered the stillness that could only mean one thing, and his tension climbed so high that Star started sidestepping under him. Now, with Star well away with the other horses and nothing to do but stare at the mess, he just felt queasy. The knot in his stomach pulled tighter when Bishop looked over to Jed, who was poking at the coals of the big fire in the center of the camp. “Good thing you found those cows when you did,” he called. “If you‟d come much further along, we could be looking at your body, too.” Jed didn‟t look up from where he was spreading out the dying embers so they‟d burn out faster. “I expect so,” he agreed. “These are the kind who kill for the sport of it.” “Yeah,” Bishop agreed. “Probably why they killed each other.” He drew a deep breath but grimaced when the stench of lost blood and loosed bowels on the air caught at him. He spat on the ground before asking Jed, “Can you look around, make sure nobody got clear of this? If we‟ve got somebody else to hunt down, I‟d like to hire you on for the job.” Jed nodded and walked the camp‟s perimeter, and Gideon stood still and watched him, watched the way his hair fell forward when he knelt to look at something on the ground, and watched the way his mouth moved to chant a silent prayer each time he rose. Gideon swallowed down the knowledge that Jed wouldn‟t find any sign because Jed hadn‟t left this to chance. Nobody had gotten clear of this. “He‟s damned good,” Bishop said softly, startling Gideon.

“He got me and my horse from Montana to here in one piece,” Gideon replied. “Around mining camps and right through Indian country. He‟s a good man.” Bishop made a noncommittal sound and nodded, and Gideon let his eyes wander back to Jed. Jed finished his circuit and prowled back to the dying fire where Bishop stood waiting, and shook his head. “There are no tracks leading away from this.” He tilted his head toward the man who‟d tried to crawl away. “And he was their leader. He is big. His guns are the nicest, and he wears finer clothes of any of these other men.” Deputy Rock frowned and took long strides toward the corpse on its belly, but when he got there all he did was stare down at it. “Looks like he started something he couldn‟t finish,” he called thoughtfully. “Yes,” Jed said. “It does.” Rock just stared at the dead man for the longest moment, before Bishop shook himself and called to his men, “Let‟s get these sons of bitches buried, clear this place up.” “Take him back with us,” Jed said to Bishop, inclining his head toward Rock and the man he‟d knifed. That death hadn‟t been quick or easy—not the kind of death a white man would have designed, Gideon decided—but he felt no remorse. If anything, he liked Jed all the more for this carnage, and that thought unsettled him some. He liked to think he was a modern, civilized man. For the most part. “Why?” Bishop bristled. Clearly, he wasn‟t liking the idea. “Let Mrs. Hennessey identify him. Let her know he is truly dead.” “We can gather up their stuff, too,” Gideon offered, “give it to her to compensate her for all they took.” Rock had walked over to join them while they talked. “I knew George Hennessey,” he said stiffly. “He was worth more than eight horses.” Gideon held up his hands. “I didn‟t mean no offense, Deputy,” he assured the man. “I could tell just by her kids that her husband was a good man. Brother-in-law, too, I reckon. Still, if anybody deserves this stuff, it‟s her.”

Rock turned to look at him square on. “Hers ain‟t the only farm these men rode through.” Gideon squared his shoulders back and answered Rock with a glare of his own. “Hers is the only one I saw with my own eyes,” he said, hard. Rock kept staring for a minute, then he shrugged and shot a look at Bishop. “Usually we sell things like this at auction, help pay the deputies and compensate the posses. I can‟t make that decision.” “What do you think, Earl?” Bishop asked. “You think there‟s enough folks left on those other farms to warrant trying to parcel this out?” Rock shrugged, diffident. “You think anybody deserves it more than Moira?” he asked, harder now. “She survived what they done to her, Earl. Plenty of women wouldn‟t have. I talked to her this morning, and she‟s already putting her life back in order. If she wants any of this, I‟m inclined to give it to her.” Gideon heard the admiration in Bishop‟s voice, and knew he had an ally here, a man who‟d known the Hennesseys and respected them all. “I‟m right there with you, Sheriff.” Bishop looked at him and shrugged. “I‟ve known her and her family since George was born. She‟ll be looked after, I can promise you that.” Gideon glanced around. “Fair enough,” he said, thinking anything but. He set it upon himself to check the horses and roll up the leader‟s body in a bedroll. The big bay‟s ears swiveled forward when Gideon dropped the body beside it, but other than that, it made no move. Good horse, he thought. Steady. Behind him, the deputized men had started digging two big graves, not nearly so deep or square as the ones he and Jed had dug for the Hennessey men, and it didn‟t take long, not with the twelve of them working at it. By early afternoon, they had seven bodies dumped and covered, and most of the possessions gathered up and loaded onto the horses. Gideon had planned to throw the leader‟s

body on the bay, but Jed grabbed a hank of mane at its withers and swung up onto it before Gideon could get a saddle on its back. “Jed, get down,” he snapped. “I am fine,” Jed said serenely. “I will ride this horse back to the farm.” “Unless you want to carry this damned saddle over your shoulder, get down and let me put it on the horse!” Jed frowned, but he slid off the bay‟s bare back and set a blanket carefully, then he took the saddle from Gideon and settled it with just as much care. Gideon stood back and crossed his arms over his chest, watching as Jed efficiently finished the job, picked up the lead line he‟d used to collect the cattle they hoped belonged to Moira Hennessey, and swung right back up. “You mind telling me where you want me to stow that body?” he asked dryly, looking up at Jed. Jed glanced down at the ringleader‟s corpse and shrugged. “I don‟t care where you put it,” Jed said and reined out, wrapping the lead for the cows around the saddle‟s pommel. “Sheriff,” he called quietly. “I will start ahead. The cows will be slower than the mules and horses.” Bishop waved a hand, still intent on collecting the last of the dead men‟s possessions, and somehow Gideon found himself stuck with a bunch of strangers, a pair of plow mules, and a corpse, while Jed disappeared into the trees. Bishop came to stand beside him for a moment, following his gaze in the direction Jed had gone. “He‟s a bit of an odd one, ain‟t he,” he observed mildly. Gideon resisted a smile or a frown—he felt the urge to do both right now. “That, he is,” he agreed, heartily enough that Bishop gave him an odd look before he turned and walked away. Gideon watched him go. Bishop didn‟t even know the half of it. It didn‟t take long to finish what they‟d started, not with a dozen men combing the camp for any valuables missed or strewn around during the supposed fight. Men‟s voices echoed quietly through the clearing, anxious deference to the dead most like, but they found another couple of handguns and two boxes of shotgun shells, and it

seemed like half the posse needed to check the pack job Gideon had done before they could clear out of this place. The staples had all been tied onto the dead men‟s horses, and somebody fashioned lead lines out of what rope remained, so that two of them led three and four packed horses respectively as they cleared the camp. The ride out started quiet enough, but the farther away they got from the remains of the camp, the noisier and happier the men got. “Can‟t believe we lucked out like that,” one fella, Bob, said, riding alongside Gideon with three horses trailing him. “Yeah,” Gideon agreed, or tried to. “Seems like they got dealt just what they deserved.” Bob kneed his horse closer to Gideon, speaking the quiet confidences most men were happy to share with strangers they knew they‟d never see again. “I ain‟t seen my wife in four days now,” he whispered. “We‟ve been going off every Friday, scouring the countryside around here. I worried every time I left her it‟d be the last time I did.” “I c‟n understand that,” Gideon said, letting him talk. Bob worked at the old lumber mill when he wasn‟t deputized for law enforcement duties. Business, Gideon learned, had slowed a lot now that the gold had been cleaned out of this region. But mostly, Bob talked about his wife, about how fine she was and about how glad he was these men were dead, so he wouldn‟t have to leave her again. The subject nearest his heart pushed him to the subject of wives and women in general. “Mrs. Hennessey‟s lucky,” Bob said at one point. “You clearly ain‟t seen her since them men ran through, then,” Gideon replied, harder than he‟d meant to. Bob‟s shoulders hunched in a little, but he pressed on, “If it‟d been my wife, I wouldn‟t have wanted her to die and let them bastards win. Or leave our kids orphans.” Gideon sighed and ground his teeth together. These were all decent people, and he didn‟t know why he kept forgetting that. “Put like that,” Gideon allowed, “I reckon you‟ve got a point.”

Bishop and the rest of his people relaxed more the further they got from the dead. The threat was gone without confrontation, and no blood of their own had been shed. Gideon tried to catch their spirit, and in a way, he did. He appreciated the turn of mood, as long as they didn‟t visit it on Mrs. Hennessey who was still mourning her husband and coping with what had been done to her. Still, by the time they‟d caught up with Jed, Gideon found himself answering questions and telling stories, but every so often he‟d turn to look at Jed, riding quietly at the back of the group, and he‟d worry. The sun hung low in the western sky by the time they neared the house, and Bishop dropped back to ride beside Gideon, slowing them both until they‟d put plenty of space between them and the others. “Earl told me the details that you gave him,” he said quietly, keeping his eyes on the hindquarters of a horse ahead of them. “About all that happened at the Hennesseys‟ place.” Gideon nodded, catching a glimpse of the man‟s hard face before he turned his own eyes forward. “Me and Jed came on the farm not long after the raiders had left. I don‟t reckon Mrs. Hennessey is going to feel safe there alone for a while, but we can‟t stay on much longer— I‟ve got to get on to San Francisco, catch up with my family.” Bishop nodded, and his saddle creaked as he shifted. “We take care of our own, Mister Makepeace. Today was my regular day to ride out to that side of the county, so if you hadn‟t come along, I‟d have found Moira and her young‟uns and what happened.” He sounded defensive, so Gideon turned his head and met his eyes squarely. “That‟s good to know, Sheriff,” he said, meaning it. “Just a coincidence that we stumbled along when we did. Glad we could be of some help, though. They‟re good people, sure as hell didn‟t deserve any of this.” “No,” he agreed. “Earl‟s wife, Rose, is coming out. They‟re good friends. At a time like this, I reckon another woman‟s the best help.” Gideon nodded, but his mind got caught up in something Jed had said that morning, about his mother and the women of the reservation. He glanced over his shoulder to find Jed turned toward one of the cows he was leading, talking low to the animal in that gentle and kind way he

used with Star. Gideon tried, but he couldn‟t pull the image to mind of the anger on Jed‟s face that first night here, of the man who could do what Jed had done in that camp. Most of the posse split away before they reached the Hennessey farm, heading off to Sutter Creek or wherever each man called home. Bishop and Rock—Earl, as he told Gideon to call him—took over the leads of the dead men‟s horses while Jed took the mules and kept the cows. As they neared the homestead, George and the kids ran out into the yard to meet them. Bishop and Rock stopped well away from the fences, and both of them dismounted to tie off the horses on leads. George followed Jed to settle the cows and mules, but Gideon walked on up to the house with Bishop, curious he supposed. He wasn‟t proud of it. Bishop did most of the talking, stepping up onto the porch and standing close to the widow, even though he didn‟t touch her until she reached out a hand to him. When she did, he grabbed it and squeezed it tight, but eased his body back a half a step. If he had to bet, Mrs. Hennessey wouldn‟t want for protection or affection when she was ready for it. Bishop wasn‟t pushy, but it was clear he was worried about her and that he cared. And when Sarah fell on her butt and started crying, it was Bishop who swooped in to pick her up, tickling her until she squealed with laughter. Mrs. Hennessey smiled faintly, and Gideon nodded to himself. They‟d be all right. “I‟ve got supper on—more than plenty for just you gentlemen,” Mrs. Hennessey said. “I thought—well,” she said, waving her hand, “I thought there‟d be more people coming back than just you and Earl, Dale.” “Well, Moira, this took a lot less time than we expected. We‟ve buried every body except one. I‟d appreciate you taking a look at him, confirming that we found the right men?” Her body stiffened, but she nodded and reached for his hand again. He tucked it into the crook of his elbow and together with Deputy Rock and Gideon, escorted her back to the edge of the yard and the pack horses. She stopped a good ten feet away and waited while Rock walked over and lifted the oilskin away from the corpse‟s face.

Mrs. Hennessey didn‟t gasp. She just pressed her lips closer together and nodded. “That was him, that was the leader,” she said, and if her voice was shrill, Gideon sure couldn‟t blame her. “The Indian, Jedediah, thought so. He‟s the one suggested we bring him back here, so you could see for yourself that he wouldn‟t be able to bother you or anyone, ever again.” She blinked uncertainly around at all three of them. “Where did you find them, Dale? What…?” “Come on, if you‟ve got a big supper on, you need to see to it. I‟ll tell you whatever you want to know before George gets back from milking. Fair enough?” “Yes… yes.” Her eyes welled briefly, and she reached her free hand to swipe away the tears. “Thank you, Dale, for finding these men and for killing them!” “Well now, I didn‟t exactly do that.” He turned her gently and led her back to the house with a quiet order for Gideon and Rock to bring up the other six horses. Gideon all but left his string of horses for Rock. This was a story he couldn‟t afford to miss. Pretty much, Bishop told it exactly like Jed had, finishing with, “like they got drunk and did it to themselves.” “I—just like that?” she asked, like she couldn‟t believe it. The way Bishop told it, it did sound too good to be true. Mrs. Hennessey‟s voice hardened. “They couldn‟t have got drunk five days ago and done away with themselves, before they ever caught sight of our home?” “I wish to God they had, you know that. But the rest of ‟em are dead, too, and planted in a shallow grave miles from here. This one, we‟ll dump in a ravine somewhere for the coyotes.” Her laugh was short and bitter. “Makes me feel bad for the coyotes.” Bishop‟s answering chuckle sounded hollow. “Guess so.” He patted her hand then looked back over his shoulder, frowning when he saw Gideon so close. He threw a glare that drew Gideon up short, and Rock, who‟d finally caught up to them, too.

“We‟ll, uh, get the staples unpacked,” Rock offered, “bring ‟em around and set ‟em on the back porch. That all right with you, Moira?” “Yes,” she said vaguely. “Thank you, Earl.” Gideon and Rock worked in silence, pulling only the dry goods and leaving the rest for Bishop to figure out. “Where‟s George?” Rock asked him on their fourth trip around the house. “I reckon he‟s milking the cows we brought back,” Gideon said. “That‟s what he did when Jed brought the first two home.” “He‟s a good boy,” Rock said approvingly, and Gideon nodded. “Let‟s go help him. He won‟t be able to carry all that by himself.” They walked together across to the barn, where Jed was emptying a metal pail into two big wooden buckets attached to each end of a yoke. “I got near nine gallons from ‟em already, poor things,” George said, sitting on his stool beside the last cow with full udders. Jed returned the pail to him, and he bent back to his work. “It is good that we found them, before they dried up.” Jed said it with such conviction that Gideon wondered where Jed had learned anything about keeping dairy cows. For a second, he had a vision of Jed sitting on a stool, his hair tied back while he pulled a cow‟s teat. It made him smile. “Yep,” George said, working away. Jed squeezed the boy‟s shoulder and turned to face them. “I can take that up to the house,” he said, inclining his head to the buckets. “Don‟t worry about it,” Rock said. “I got it.” He bent carefully to the task and grunted as he hefted the yoke and steadied it on his shoulders. “The rest fit into this pail?” “I got it, Mister Rock,” George said from under the cow. “Thank you kindly.” Gideon wanted to linger, but he didn‟t have a good excuse, and Jed was giving him a funny look anyway. “Go on, Gideon,” he ordered softly. “I will walk back with George and carry the pail.”

Gideon nodded and squeezed Jed‟s arm before he followed Rock back up the path. Rock had the milk set on the porch by the time Gideon joined him, and he rubbed at his shoulder. “That‟s no job for a boy his age.” Gideon tested the waters a little. “You think it might be a job for Sheriff Bishop? Or his eldest?” Rock looked like he was trying not to smile. “He‟s always been fond of this whole family, Gideon,” he whispered, casting a quick look at the closed kitchen door. “He‟ll make sure she‟s took care of. If not by him, then by someone she approves of.” Gideon nodded. “Good to hear. Come on, I smell more chicken, and that woman can cook like nobody‟s business.” “That, she can,” Rock agreed with a chuckle. “Better‟n my wife, anyway—though I‟ll deny that if you ever repeat it,” he said, a mock warning that made Gideon smile. He was doing that more today, and it felt strange after all that he‟d learned. Strange, but good. They tapped on the kitchen door before they entered and found Mrs. Hennessey in a rocking chair by the warm hearth, darning something, Gideon couldn‟t tell what. Sheriff Bishop had Sarah parked against his hip while he stirred something in a big iron pot, and the scene was as domestic and comfortable as any Gideon could have hoped for, under the circumstances. Mrs. Hennessey asked a carefully vague question every minute or two, and Bishop answered promptly, without embellishment. “We collected everything of value that they had on them, Moira,” he said eventually. “Gideon here thought you ought to have it, if you wanted it.” She looked up at Gideon with a fierceness to her face that made him want to take a step back. He would have if he‟d been standing, but he‟d taken a seat with Earl near the fire, letting its heat bake away some of the tension of the day. “I thank you for the thought, Mister Makepeace,” she said, trying to be sincere but failing, “but I don‟t want anything those men touched. I wouldn‟t even take back our food if I didn‟t have the children to think of.” Her hands clutched tight around

her darning needles, and Gideon kept a watch on them, not wanting to find the point of one sticking into him. “Think of the kids now, Moira,” Bishop said. “You could sell that stuff off, have a nice dowry for Sarah here, or for anything else you need.” “You think of your kids, Dale,” she answered, dry, but her grip loosened, and her knuckles weren‟t quite so white. “Don‟t things like that usually get auctioned off to pay your salary?” The way he twitched made Gideon hide a grin. This was a man caught out, no doubt about it. “Think about it,” he said gruffly, and finally set both spoon and child down. A commotion outside heralded George‟s noisy entry, and Jed followed right behind him. “The milk is covered,” he said. “George is very skilled.” He said the words soberly, but his eyes twinkled while George‟s chest puffed up a little. “Pa said I work real hard,” he said, earnest, smiling for a second before the words caught up with him. Jed patted his head in passing as he headed toward his usual corner. He‟d stand there and hold up the wall, or he‟d slide down it, legs crossed in front of him, and just watch. “He was right,” Jed told the boy. Mrs. Hennessey put her sewing aside and set the table, shooing away every man who tried to help her except George. She still held herself carefully away from everyone, and all of the men gave her a wide, respectful berth. Chairs were rounded up and toddlers balanced on familiar knees, and soon enough Gideon got to taste what had kept his mouth watering for the last half an hour. He was glad those dead chickens hadn‟t gone to waste, but he didn‟t say anything now, leaving compliments to the men she knew and trusted. Beside him, Jed did the same, even though the Indian‟s table manners were better than Bishop‟s and Earl‟s, both of whom forgot about the napkins they had tucked in their shirtfronts. As soon as the plates were cleared, Bishop gathered up Earl. “Take that horse with the body into town. Let the newspaper man take

a picture, if he wants—it‟ll be good news as far as it travels, that those bastards are done in. Leave the story to me, if you can bear to,” he added with a friendly grin. “Don‟t you worry about that, Dale,” Rock said fervently. “I wouldn‟t know where to start.” Gideon was glad of that. “Sheriff,” he said, though, before Rock could leave. “We‟ll be staying on another night, if you want to ride back with Earl.” “I‟ll stay here, if it‟s all right with Moira. Camp in the barn with you boys,” he said, most likely for Mrs. Hennessey‟s sake. “Earl, you send Constance out with Rose in the morning, all right?” Constance was his eldest child, fifteen years old and a grown woman, to hear Bishop tell it. “If the boys can manage the house for a day on their own, I‟d like Moira to have all the help she needs to set her house in order.” “Will do, Dale.” He‟d pulled his hat back on while they talked, and now he touched the brim. “Moira. You take care now. I‟ll see you in church on Sunday.” She nodded at him, giving another of her faint smiles, and the kids rushed to wave him off, with George leading the way. Jed set to helping with the cleaning, and Gideon would have as well if Bishop hadn‟t caught his eye and tilted his head toward the back door. “Gideon,” he said, “you mind giving me a hand with those other horses?” Gideon shook his head, curious. “Glad to. We‟ll need to find a way to hobble ‟em, ‟cause that corral sure ain‟t gonna hold them all.” “I‟d appreciate your help then, working something out.” He picked up his hat from the back of his chair. “Moira, Jed. Back soon,” he said. It was almost full dark by the time they left the house, but the fat crescent moon was up, and the lantern gave them enough light to work by, unloading valuables and stacking them inside the barn, then unsaddling and brushing down the horses. They were fine stock, and Gideon wondered if any of them had been rightfully owned by their riders.

“I‟ve caught those riders‟ trails more than once, but days cold,” Bishop said idly as they worked. “Lost ‟em in a river or a creek crossing or to rains washing the tracks away.” “Yeah?” “Yep. We been pretty sure there were eight of them for weeks now, the way the horses were loaded. You can tell, you know, if one‟s carrying a man or pack gear, just from the way they plant their hooves.” “I‟ve heard tell.” He was looking at a roan‟s hoof right now, trying to examine the frog by lantern light. “It ain‟t a skill of mine,” he said, and grinned to himself. “I‟m more flash, trick shooting and riding, that kind of thing. Reckon Jed might know a thing about that sort of tracking, though.” He said it without thinking, and it was only as the words left his mouth that he thought maybe he shouldn‟t be talking about the other man. “Trick shooting. Uh huh. You know what I‟ve been thinking about that camp?” Bishop asked. “What?” he grunted. “That men who‟ve been pillaging together for as long as that gang has don‟t shoot each other.” Gideon almost dropped the horse‟s leg. “Well, it‟s clear that they did,” he said. Boots on hard pack thudded closer, and Gideon felt his heart start to race. “Not really,” Bishop said. “What‟s clear is that it looked that way. And that nobody got away to tell a different story.” Gideon gave up and set the horse‟s hoof down, turning so he could see the flecks of lantern light bounce off Bishop‟s eyes. “What are you saying?” Bishop shrugged. “As the law? Nothin‟. As a man who knows what‟s what?” He tilted his head, then after a second he slowly extended his hand. “Thanks.” Gideon stiffened and looked down at the man‟s hand. “I don‟t know what you‟re talkin‟ about,” he croaked.

The hand hung in the air between them for a long moment, until eventually it dropped back by Bishop‟s side. “Your Indian guide‟s damned good. I looked for his boot prints on the way back, didn‟t see a one, not in either direction. He stayed off the dirt or in the mud the horses turned up. And he walks toe to heel, so I‟d have been able to spot it. If he took you there, and the two of you did them men in… if, I‟m saying. Just speculating, all right? I‟d understand that.” The tension between them felt like the tension before the chute opened at a show, a thousand pounds of horse or bull underneath you just ready to do its best to harm. Gideon stood there in the tight silence, watching Bishop watch him without the first idea what to say. This man was a hell of a lot more skilled at the back country than Gideon had given him credit for, and worse, George liked this guy. George probably couldn‟t wait to confirm how Jed had been gone that first morning and brought the cows home late in the day. He felt his jaw work, but didn‟t open his lips. Something his mother had told him years ago sprang to mind: Son, people can think all they want. Long as you don‟t give ‟em reasons to be sure, most folks will leave you be. He‟d held the silence too long, though, because Bishop nodded his head once, sharply, like they‟d reached some kind of agreement. “Tales like that get men killed, Mister Bishop,” Gideon said, carefully not using the man‟s proper title. “Don‟t do anybody any good to go spreadin‟ ‟em.” “Oh, don‟t you worry about that,” Bishop assured him. “I plan to report exactly what me and my men saw, and not one damned thing else.” Gideon stared at him for a long moment, watching the shadows of the lantern light play across the man‟s still face. “Look,” Gideon said finally, “I got no opinion about what you think, except to say that there‟s no way we‟d have left that woman and her kids alone after what we seen had been done here, and to vouch for the fact that Jed was with us except for that little time he went off to find the cows. But don‟t mention your theory to Jed, okay? He‟s an Indian, and he‟s heard all

the things folks think about his kind. He won‟t take kindly to someone calling him a murderer.” Bishop looked out toward the house, where the glow of fire and lamps gave the windows a cheerful glow. “I can do that,” he said. “You two won‟t be hanging around here long, will you?” “Hell, no!” Gideon replied, thinking he‟d be willing to ride out in the dark right now, after what Bishop had just laid out. He wanted to get the hell out of this county before the man changed his mind. Bishop chuckled, low. “I‟d have done the same, if I‟d been given the chance,” he said. “I swear that to you. Your friend, Jedediah. He‟s decent.” “He is,” Gideon agreed, all too happy to agree to that. “Real decent.” The irony of it caught him, though, that this man, the law here, was calling Jed a decent man because he‟d done something that at any other time could have started a massacre. Bishop waved a hand, cutting a dark shadow through the night. “Call me Dale.” They finished up quick after that. Dale filled in the silence mostly, chatting idly about life in Sutter Creek and how nice it was when they weren‟t chasing down „damned animals like these bastards‟. Gideon‟s skin crawled the whole way back to the house, and it positively itched when they let themselves back inside, and Dale Bishop walked right over to the corner where Jed leaned and struck up a friendly conversation with him, like Jed was his long-lost cousin. Jed threw Gideon more than a few confused looks, but he nodded and paid attention, answering the innocent questions about where he was from and what he liked to do with his time—whenever Bishop paused long enough to let him. When the toddlers started making tired noises, Jed excused himself and helped Mrs. Hennessey settle them in her bed just like he‟d done the night before. Gideon worried that it might give Bishop the wrong impression, but the man nodded to himself again, clearly approving.

“Reckon it‟s past my bedtime, too,” Gideon said, staring hard at Jed. “Jed, you want to share the lantern on the way out to the barn?” George jumped up and jumped in. “I can walk him out when he‟s ready,” he offered, all man-of-the-house. “But I am ready now, George,” Jed said, “so there is no need. We will see you in the morning.” He nodded to Mrs. Hennessey and shook Bishop‟s proffered hand, frowning again Gideon‟s way. Gideon jerked his head toward the door to hurry him along. As soon as he got Jed out of the house, he told him the news. “Bishop‟s figured you out,” he whispered tightly. “Said flat out that he reckoned you and I had gone out and done in them killers. George‟ll tell him soon enough that I never left, so….” Jed‟s eyes widened enough to catch a glint off the kerosene lamp, but he didn‟t look upset. “So that is why he was so friendly,” he said thoughtfully. “Yeah,” Gideon said, neither friendly nor thoughtful. He still wasn‟t sure they shouldn‟t ride off right now. Jed just looked at him. “Calm down, Gideon. I thought he was a good man, and I‟m glad to know I was right.” Gideon blinked as his jaw dropped open, and he snapped it shut hard enough that his teeth clicked audibly. “What?” Jed prodded. Gideon shook his head. “Nothin‟. It‟s just—that‟s pretty much exactly what he said about you.” A low chuckle from Jed, warm and rich, made Gideon‟s skin itch again. “It ain‟t funny!” Jed lifted the wooden latch on the barn door and pulled it open, stepping back to let Gideon and the lamp inside first. “No,” he said more soberly. “It is not. Still… irony and tragedy have a way of working together.” Gideon bit his lip to keep from being waspish. The only thing worse‟n a spiritually sated Indian killer was one who found the humor in the situation. Instead, he said through clenched teeth, “We‟re leaving at first light.”

Jed snorted. “That is the way you‟ll repay Mrs. Hennessey‟s hospitality? And show George there are good men in the world, even strangers?” Gideon frowned as he set the lantern aside and laid out his bedroll, pulling up new hay to try and insulate his back through the cold night. When he turned around he almost tripped over Jed, who was right behind him, spreading his blankets out alongside. “You can‟t sleep that close,” he groused. “In this weather?” Jed snorted again. “We could share blankets, now that Sheriff Bishop will be joining us.” Then he raised his eyebrows and said pointedly, “Because warmth is all we will share this night.” Gideon huffed out an annoyed breath. “You thought I thought any different? Hell,” he muttered, “I couldn‟t get it up if I tried—I‟m too damn scared to be thinking of things like that.” A hand ghosted over his backside, then cupped one of his ass cheeks and squeezed. “I‟d wager you could,” Jed said, teasing him. The hand left, and Gideon figured he was grinding his molars down to nothing, at this rate. “You know,” Gideon finally whispered, “it‟s damned perverse that killing them men puts you in such good spirits.” Jed froze, bent over to arrange his blankets more to his liking, and threw his head hard enough that his hair flew over his shoulder, showing Gideon his face. “They were not men,” he said, more forcefully this time. “I have never killed a man, and I never will, if I can help it.” He straightened and let his hands drop loosely to his sides, but there was nothing easy about him. “It was not the releasing of their spirits,” he breathed. “It was that we were able to help the woman. There was no one to help my mother for many days, outside her sisters and other women who had suffered the same fate. No one ever hunted down and punished the man who shamed her.” Just like that, Gideon‟s anger ran off like snow melt, leaving him choked up and feeling all these damned emotions Jed didn‟t want him to feel. How the hell was he not supposed to admire a man who cared

so much? He reached out and caught Jed‟s hand, holding it in his own. “Yeah,” he said softly. “We did help, didn‟t we?” Jed‟s gaze trailed from his face down to their joined hands. He didn‟t say anything, but he tightened his hold on Gideon‟s fingers for a few seconds before letting go. “We will leave in the morning,” he said. “But not at first light. We will wait until you‟re awake.” Gideon shook his head, wanting desperately to be annoyed, but he couldn‟t muster it up, so he turned his face away to hide his grin. They took off their boots and settled into their bedrolls, Jed on his back and Gideon rolled up on one side facing him. Gideon supposed he was watching Jed pretty hard in the lantern light, and he heard the noise a few seconds after Jed stiffened: footsteps and quiet voices. George wasn‟t as quiet as he thought, Gideon noticed, irritated all over again. “They‟ll be asleep, prob‟ly, Dale,” he said. The barn door creaked open and a gust of cooler air slid in with the lantern George carried. “Boys?” Bishop called, quiet enough if they‟d been sleeping, but Jed rolled away from Gideon and lifted up on one elbow. “Trouble?” Jed asked. “Nope,” Bishop said. “Just wanted to bed down and didn‟t want to step on nobody.” Gideon squinted against the lantern light and watched, surprised when Bishop dropped his bedroll right in front of Jed. “You mind?” Bishop asked. “It gets damned cold at night.” In answer, Jed scooted back a little closer to Gideon, and Gideon felt his hand rise to rest on Jed‟s waist almost before he could stop it. He forced it back down in front of him, into the warm space between Jed‟s back and his front. Bishop rolled his bedroll out a foot in front of Jed, and Gideon worried the man was trying to box Jed in, but when George left with the lantern a minute later and Bishop blew out their lamp before stretching out with a groan, Jed settled right down and sighed. “Warm,” he muttered in the dark.

“Good,” Bishop answered. “See you boys in the mornin‟.” It seemed like no time at all before he was snoring softly, and Jed‟s breaths evened out into deep and peaceful sleep. Gideon wanted to poke him. He restrained himself, barely, and glared at the back of Jed‟s head—at least, where he imagined it was. He couldn‟t see his hand in front of his face in here. Star whuffed in her stall, ten feet away. Her hooves clomped as she shifted her weight in her sleep. He rolled over and closed his eyes, trying to fall asleep like everybody else had. But as he drifted toward it, Bishop‟s words drifted through his mind—If he took you there and the two of you did them men in…. He jerked awake, but in the darkness, he saw Jed‟s face as it had been in the barn that night, his lips pulled back in a primal snarl. I don‟t kill men, Jed‟s voice echoed in his head. They could have left at first light; Gideon was still awake from the night before.

“YOU could stay on. We got lots of things that need to be done around here and—” “George.” Gideon reached out and dropped a hand on the boy‟s shoulder, then crouched down so he could look George in the face. “It‟s going to be all right. Sheriff Bishop is here. He‟ll look out for you and your ma and the kids. I got to get on to San Francisco, see my own ma.” George stared for a few seconds, and when his chin started to quiver, Gideon almost gave ground. But just as the words came to his lips, Jed said quietly, “George, your mother is calling for you.” He stood in the barn doorway behind George, and Gideon could see the sadness in his eyes that George didn‟t. By the time George had drawn a breath and swallowed down his tears, Jed‟s face was unreadable. He nodded as George turned to him and held the door open as the boy trotted past.

Gideon pushed himself back to his feet and shook his head. “You think we should stay another day or so? Just to be sure they‟re all right?” he asked. Jed pushed the door closed and moved over to where his blanket and pack were sitting. “You meet so very many people in your travels,” Jed said slowly. Gideon shrugged. “Yeah.” “Do so few affect you deeply?” Gideon frowned. “What?” Jed turned to stare back up toward the house. “Staying longer does not make leaving easier. We should go now, while there are others to distract the boy and his mother. They will be well, Gideon.” Gideon sighed loudly. Even though Jed was right, it still didn‟t sit well. Jed chuckled low and tilted his head around. “And you have to meet your own mother.” He smirked as he quoted Gideon‟s words back to him, as if a grown man needing his mother was the silliest thing he‟d ever heard. Gideon frowned because Jed expected it of him and tightened Star‟s girth. The family and Sheriff Bishop had congregated on the back porch to separate cream from milk when Jed and Gideon made their way across the yard, leading Star who was packed and ready. “Ma‟am,” Gideon said, smiling to Mrs. Hennessey as she put down a big wooden spatula and stepped forward. “I want to thank you two again for what you‟ve done for us,” she said, looking from Jed to Gideon and back. “I‟ll never be able to repay you for it, for—well, for everything. Mostly for giving me back some peace of mind, and for… for burying my husband and his brother so nice. George always did like that stand of trees.” Gideon shifted uncomfortably and glanced to Bishop who was watching him with a slight smile on his face. Gideon knew what she was thinking—same thing Bishop was—but it didn‟t make his skin

crawl as bad as it had last night. Maybe he was getting used to it. “We didn‟t do nothing any decent man wouldn‟t do,” he said, meaning it, but parroting Bishop‟s comment from last night. He wanted Bishop to remember that, that Jed was decent no matter what he‟d done to those bastards in that clearing. “But you did it for me and mine,” she said, “and I‟m grateful.” She swiped her hands down her apron front and looked toward the side of the house. I‟d like for you to have something for your trouble— George?” she said and the boy nodded, grinning wide as he scampered off the porch and around to the front of the house. “We got all we need,” Gideon said, worried that she was giving up food. “Jed and I can find more than enough to take care of us—” “You can‟t find this,” Mrs. Hennessey cut him off, waving one hand to silence him. At that point, George walked back around the corner of the house, dwarfed by the big bay gelding that Jed had ridden the day before. “Sheriff Bishop said that you two only had the one horse. Since you brought back our cows and mules,” she said, looking to Jed, “and since you found the men who—who did all this, then you should have a horse of your own.” Jed blinked, and Gideon had the pleasure of seeing him surprised. He looked at Gideon with a sort of „help me‟ expression, and Gideon shook his head, grinning. This was going to be fun. “Thank you,” Jed said as George led the horse in close. “But you should—” “I don‟t want one damned thing from those animals,” she said, her voice low and hard. It startled all of the men and George‟s smile vanished as he turned to stare up at his mother. “And I don‟t want anything by way of them.” Her hands were on her hips, and her eyes flared with anger, as if Jed had insulted her. “I only kept this because you need it—so you take it, Jedediah Buffalo Bird, you take it and let something good come from all this.” Frowning, Jed nodded his thanks, but turned his eyes to Bishop. “I doubt that this horse actually belonged to him….”

“You got that right,” Bishop said fervently. “So I drew up a bill of sale—I carry county papers all the time, so I can make sure to handle things like this right and proper.” He reached into his coat pocket and brought out a folded piece of paper, stepping down off the porch to hand it to Jed. “It says—” “I can read,” Jed interrupted mildly. He unfolded the paper, and Gideon edged in close to read over his shoulder. A big County of Amador seal was imprinted in red at the top, and Sheriff Bishop had carefully lettered the date, the legal transfer of ownership of the horse from the County to one Jedediah Buffalo Bird, and the reason for the sale: payment in kind for the services of a skilled tracker in the successful apprehension of wanted criminals. Jed‟s lips pursed and his fine brows drew together briefly, but he nodded and lifted his head. “You are very generous. I‟m sure any man could have followed the trail they left.” “Maybe,” Bishop shrugged, “but you‟re the man who did.” He didn‟t say anything else about it, and Gideon was grateful. “Suppose we‟d best get a move on,” Gideon said, because someone had to say it. “Mrs. Hennessey, I‟ll remember your chicken for a long time to come.” She looked startled then dimpled. “Good thing you said that,” she said, “because I cooked up some lunch for you boys when I made breakfast this morning. Nothing much, just bread and chicken, but it‟ll keep you from having to buy a meal today. It‟s in that sack on Jed‟s horse,” she said, pointing. Jed handed Gideon his new horse‟s reins and stepped up onto the porch. “May I?” he asked, pointing to the little table where she‟d laid the spatula. Other utensils, including a sharp butcher knife she or George had used to dress the chickens, sat on it. She nodded, looking confused, but Jed just picked up the knife, tilted his head sideways, and cut off a hank of his hair, from underneath toward the back. He set the knife back down and held out the long lock to her. “Among my people, it is a sign of strength and honor. You are strong.”

Tears welled, making the green of her eyes shine in the morning sun, and she reached a tentative hand to take it from him. “That‟s… I don‟t know what to say.” “Then say nothing,” Jed said, and smiled. He stepped off the porch with a nod for George and Sheriff Bishop, took his horse‟s reins from Gideon, and led the way off the homestead. They mounted up at the edge of the cleared land, and Gideon turned to wave a last goodbye from Star‟s back. He leaned down close to her ear to give her a command, backing it up with a lift and touch of his knee to her withers, centering himself as she rose on her back legs and pawed the air with one hoof. He could hear George‟s laughter all the way out here, and ahead of him, Jed shook his head. “Always the showman, Gideon?” he chided. Gideon smiled as they rode out.

Chapter 9

THE morning was sunny and cool, with an easy grade downhill most of the way, and as the day wore on, Gideon‟s spirits tried to lift with the temperature. It was more settled here, the land no longer wild but giving way regularly to farms and fenced pastures, mills and old mining operations along the river. They couldn‟t go far at all before seeing signs of people, either smoke from a hearth or cultivated fields, cattle herds or orchards. It made him realize just how barren the Midwest still was, outside the mining towns, rail stops, and state capitals, and how heavily peopled California was. No wonder the show had so many stops in this state. Them that had come for the dream of gold had stayed on for rich soil and good weather, finding their fortunes however they could. San Francisco really wasn‟t that far away anymore. This adventure would be over, and soon. In the past when he‟d separated from his family and Bill Tourney‟s show, he‟d always been happy to get back to it, and them. He‟d never felt this disheartened at the idea of meeting up with them, but rejoining them meant losing Jed. He‟d carried that knowledge this whole trip, but only now did it feel real to him. They stopped for lunch at a creek crossing as the sun reached its zenith, and Gideon ate more than his fair share of Mrs. Hennessey‟s chicken, mostly at Jed‟s urging. His musings had left him without much appetite, even comforted as he was by Jed‟s quiet chanting, but he ate what Jed pressed on him, dredging up the will to appreciate her good cooking.

“You ever lived in a city before?” he asked. “Yes,” Jed said, surprising the hell out of him. “I lived in Laramie, Wyoming, for two years when I first left the reservation.” Gideon whistled. Laramie was big enough that Bill Tourney ran the show through there when he could. “Huh,” Gideon said. “Somehow, I can‟t picture that, with you hatin‟ white folks like you do.” “I do not hate white people,” Jed said, chiding him a little. More quietly he added, “Mostly I just fear them. They are not consistent, not in their beliefs or in their behavior. The Christian Bible says to do unto others as you would have them do unto you,” he mused, “but many white people, even the Christians, do not. They do to others as they wish, as their white laws allow, and at great cost to their spirits and the land.” “That they do,” Gideon agreed. Hell, he couldn‟t argue it. He‟d seen all kinds of people in his travels with the show. He‟d grown up getting to know folks from all walks of life—farmers and shopkeepers, politicians and immigrants—and liking most of them. The differences were what made folks interesting, what made them unique, and what kept him from getting bored with meeting so many of them. The show moved regular, and the only place he‟d ever lived for any length of time had been New Orleans, the big port city in the deep South where the show wintered. Bill had a rambling old farm there that his mother had left him, and those in the show who didn‟t have families waiting for them lived on the property, working on new acts. Those that didn‟t travel stayed on the farm, caring for what animals weren‟t going with the show that season, celebrating Christmas—generally behaving as any big family did. Until he‟d traveled this land with Jed, he‟d seen cities and mines, forestry, Franklin stoves, gaslights, railroads, and all the conveniences of civilization as benefits, as folks just making good use of the land. Seeing the country through Jedediah‟s eyes, though, and watching him walk through it without leaving much to show for his passing, Gideon could understand better how progress might not be an entirely good

thing. Still, from all the stories he‟d heard, it wasn‟t like the Indians were much better. “Indians ain‟t that way, too? Inconsistent?” Jed frowned as he chewed on a hunk of bread. “They are,” he said slowly, “but not so much. My people—not just the Lakota, those you call Sioux, but most natives of this continent—they seem genuinely more willing to allow others to be who they are, instead of what they think a people should be. Before many tribes were forced onto each other‟s hunting grounds, there was very little conflict between them.” He shrugged. “Conflict always comes when resources are scarce.” “Guess I never thought about it that way,” Gideon admitted. “You hear all kinds of stories, about Indians fighting white folks but fighting amongst themselves, too.” “Those stories are true. But they are not old stories.” Gideon nodded as he sucked the last bits of meat off his chicken leg. “We got stories—history, I mean, that go back to before Jesus was born, and it seems like we were always findin‟ somebody to war with.” “I have read many works of white men,” Jed said, “and not all of them are about war. Many of them are about your god, and those works especially I was forced to read at the school.” The mention of the school reminded Gideon of Jed‟s face back in Carson City, when Mrs. Edmundson had told of the school there. “You didn‟t have a choice about that school,” he said, tentative. He‟d shared such tales from Harold Crowe and the other Indians in Bill‟s show, but he‟d never had cause to have this conversation with someone he hadn‟t been raised up with. Jed looked up at him as he wiped his fingers on a cloth. “We did not,” he answered quietly. Gideon tried to imagine what it would have been like for him, if someone had come and taken him from his parents, from the show. There‟d been murmurs from time to time, from folks thinking that the road and a traveling show was no place to raise kids, but twenty or more children traveled with the show just about all the time, and Gideon had grown up with it. More stayed with their folks back on Bill‟s spread in New Orleans, those whose parents didn‟t want to travel while suckling babies—Gideon‟s own folks had done that, with him,

but not with his younger brother or sisters. Those parents were as important to the show as the people on the road, tending and schooling the foals, pups, and buffalo calves, living a more settled life until they decided their kids were old enough to travel. His ma taught all of the kids their letters and numbers, and she always found plenty of books or newspapers for them to study, and scoffed at the idea of leaving them with somebody not their own kin. “How will you kids learn a trade if you don‟t learn it from your folks?” she‟d asked. Besides, most of the people who said that it wasn‟t right for children to be traveling with the show were ignorant hicks in his opinion, farmers and churchgoers mostly, and he hadn‟t thought their kids were any better off than him. Them that were better educated and held the same opinion, he‟d seen his ma talk to, telling them that she was the show‟s schoolteacher, and mostly that had settled those kinds of people down. Gideon couldn‟t think of a better or more interesting life than the show, couldn‟t imagine a better family—not his own, and not the three hundred or so people who called the show home. But plenty of young folks left it when they reached marrying age. He‟d seen them in towns they passed the next year or the year after, usually running stores or working the land with families of their own. Gideon‟s younger brother lived in Ascension Parrish, west of New Orleans near Baton Rouge, with his young wife and her folks. He‟d met her one winter and stayed for good the next, worried that he‟d lose her to a local boy, and Gideon was sure they‟d be starting a family of their own soon. He couldn‟t see his sisters settling quite so easily, but maybe Grace would be one of them that stayed at Bill‟s place and kept the home fires burning, if she and her beau decided to marry. Maybe Gideon would one day himself. Working in Livingston had given him a new perspective on the things he could do other than traveling, if he found a reason to settle down. “Sometimes, people told my folks—and Bill Tourney gets an earful, too, from what he‟s said—that the show wasn‟t a proper place to raise children, but my folks never took them seriously. They love to travel, and my brothers and sisters were all born on the road.”

“My parents wanted us to stay with them also, but your government did not ask what they wished,” Jed answered. “We were handed over to the missionaries when the missionaries came for us, and tribes who resisted stopped receiving the supplies from your government that they needed to survive. It is the rule of the day, that we should be educated by white men and women, that we will be better off with white ways.” Gideon chewed on that for a long moment. “What do you think, Jed? Are you better off?” he asked, wondering how different he‟d be if his folks had been forced to give him up. “I… do not believe so,” Jed said slowly, like he‟d given the question a whole lot of thought. “I can read your books, which is probably good. There are some whites who are very wise. And I know your God.” He looked down at his hands, seeming terribly preoccupied with the cloth he‟d been using to wipe his greasy fingers on, but his voice was even as he went on. “The missionaries, the representatives for your white god, even they did not embody the ways of nature or of Him.” Gideon bit his lip to keep from pointing out the obvious, that judging a whole people just because their skin was white wasn‟t much different from what Jed accused whites of doing. Besides, while the thought of Jed‟s fear made him ache, this piece of Jed, like the other ones he had learned along the way—about Jed‟s mother, about his sexual leanings, about his killing—all of these were things that Jed was trusting him with. Despite the fact that Gideon was white, and despite everything Jed had just said, he was giving pieces of himself to Gideon. That seemed important enough that Gideon decided to honor it by keeping his damned questions to himself. “So tell me,” he said, changing the subject, “the stories of Indians stampeding buffalo herds off cliffs to kill ‟em easier, is that true?” Jedediah snorted. “Yes. Twenty buffalo, or fifty, for food and shelter, teepees and clothing, rope and bow strings.” He looked Gideon squarely in the eye. “We Sioux do not kill for sport.”

Gideon set his food aside and rubbed his hands in the grass to get some of the grease off them. Killing for sport… that was what those bastards had done. It was what plenty of folks did. “Why so sad, Gideon?” Jed asked him. When Gideon frowned confusion at him, Jed gestured with his bread. “You usually speak of good things, of love and adventure and family, or tell tales that amuse you.” Gideon shrugged. “Guess I ain‟t feeling particularly happy today.” “Why?” Because you‟re leaving soon. “Hard to, thinkin‟ about what them animals did to the Hennessey family and plenty of others, I reckon.” Jed nodded, taking his words at face value, and Gideon made an effort to cheer himself up. It‟d be a damned shame to waste what few days he had left with this man. “What kind of story would you like to hear today, Jed?” he asked. Jed smiled, and Gideon fancied it was fond. “Any story you would like to tell.” Gideon told Jed about his twin sisters, little terrors the pair of them, one as tomboy as she could get and one who loved frills and lace, but they were as close as two people could be. They‟d turned twelve this summer, and he was lonesome for them, so the stories came easy. He and Jed had been making good time following a well-traveled road most of the day, and they‟d passed plenty of travelers along the way. Every time they met a farm wagon or group on horseback, Gideon would smile and wave, while Jed would tug his hat lower on his head and stare at the ground along the side of the road. Gideon had seen this before, Jed‟s natural effort to avoid trouble with white folks who might not take kindly to an Indian off a reservation. But here in California, folks seemed a little more settled about the idea of Jed‟s dark skin and long hair. Gideon wondered if it was just because Indians had been converted long enough ago that they were more a novelty now, or if the folks they passed just had more sense than to annoy a stranger on a fit

horse with a good rifle tied to his saddle. Either way, Gideon was glad that they didn‟t have any trouble. It occurred to him that with all the people around here, they might have a problem finding someplace private to camp. He made mention on a quiet stretch of road. “I‟m lookin‟ forward to bedding down tonight,” he said, weighting his words enough that he hoped Jed would get the message. Jed did. His eyes crinkled at the corners with the tiny smile he offered, and he shook his head. “When are you not looking forward to a bed?” he asked, adding more gently, “And my body?” Gideon grinned. That was plain enough, and he was glad Jed welcomed his urge. “Think we‟ll be able to find someplace private?” he asked. “Yes,” Jed said. “I will find someplace very private.” Just the way he said the words heated Gideon up, and Gideon bit his lip to keep from suggesting that they stop early. Like, right now. Late afternoon sun burned hard into his eyeballs when the road widened out into a small collection of buildings that heralded a town in front of them. A wide, well-built bridge over a lazy river carried a sign: Mokelumne River, Lodi, California. “Lodi?” Gideon read aloud. “We‟ve made good time today.” Jed shrugged. “Downhill.” Jed stayed to the road and rode straight into town, a novelty for him, keeping his eyes low while Gideon took in a busy sawmill and clean-looking buildings. He didn‟t think much about their route until Jed slowed down near a big livery stable, pulling the bay to a stop before sliding out of the saddle. “Problem?” Gideon asked, looking around. He nodded hello when a man came out of the stable to greet them. Jed didn‟t answer Gideon but held out his reins to the newcomer. “The horses in the back,” he said, using his chin to point to the corral. “They are not stage horses.” The man, a big burly guy who didn‟t look all that friendly, said shortly, “Not hardly. We keep riding horses here, too—folks like touring out here, and we have couriers coming through every now and

again. Why?” he asked, crossing his arms over his burly chest as he held Jed‟s bay‟s reins tight in one fist. “I want to trade,” Jed said absently, “my horse for one of those.” The guy examined Jed‟s horse with new interest, stepping up to tug its lip back and check its teeth, then walking backward to the end of the reins to take a good look at its body. “This is a good-looking horse,” he said, “and it ain‟t even five years old yet. What‟s wrong with it?” “Nothing,” Jed said. “But I see an Indian pony back there.” The man‟s face set into a frown but he said, “Yeah. Couple of your boys came through a few weeks back, traded it for a rifle, shot, and three bottles of rotgut. So?” “So,” Jed said, “I am an Indian.” “So were they,” the man replied bluntly. “They didn‟t see much reason to keep it….” Gideon grinned when the man realized he might be costing himself money and changed his tune. “Of course, that‟s real good horseflesh you spotted, no doubt about that. Could be related to Frank Hopkins‟ horse, the one that won that big race overseas. Them Injuns that sold it said they was from Oklahoma or thereabouts.” Gideon put the brakes on that tall tale as quick as he could. “Ain‟t many Indians left in Oklahoma, mister,” he said curtly, “and don‟t many folks believe that story, anyway. Jed here won‟t fall for it.” He dismounted easily and grabbed up Star‟s reins. “Hang on a minute.” He walked over to the fence, nodding to the man as he passed and pulling Star along behind him to examine the pony Jed had eyes for. Its coat, a bright bay dunskin with scattered streaks on its hindquarters, was shiny and well-kept, and he kind of liked the blaze that ran down its face. He knelt down to check its sex and stood back up, eying its form. The gelding had fine conformation, but he could see the mustang blood in its size, the high ridge of its withers and the slope of its croupe. Mustangs didn‟t have a lot of room for saddlebags, back there. Mostly though, he could sense the wild in it by the way it stood apart from the other horses. “You mind, mister?” he asked, tilting his head toward the corral.

“Nah, go ahead,” the man said. “Watch out for that white mare over in the back, she likes to bite.” Gideon nodded, dropped Star‟s reins, and slipped through the fence posts. “Easy,” he whispered, edging up to the dun. Its ears swiveled, and it threw its head, but it let Gideon approach it, and held still while he lifted each dark, unshod hoof, then checked its teeth. “It‟s somewhere around seven years old, Jed,” he called out. “Older‟n the one you got now, and smaller.” “I am also small,” Jed said with a shrug. He‟d walked up to the corral fence and crossed his arms across the top post to watch Gideon check the horse over. Gideon frowned and walked back to where Jed stood, leaning on the fence from the inside. “You sure about this?” he asked, low, as he came in close to Jed. “You don‟t know anything about that mustang—” “I know enough,” he cut Gideon off. “I know it is of this land—it is not natural for it to stay here, in this corral.” He took his hat off and tossed his head, making his hair fly back over his shoulders. The mustang saw the movement and whuffed, tossing its head, ears and eyes trained on Jed. “That bay is yours,” Gideon tried again, but he was watching the mustang, too. “You‟ve got a title—” “I have a piece of paper that says this horse is mine, but it is only as good as the name of the man who signed it. Here,” he waved his hand around in a small circle, “the people may know Sheriff Bishop. But as we ride further away, his name will mean less and less. A man like me, an Indian, may not be accepted on a fine horse like that, Gideon. We both know it. Being with you might make it safe for a while, but when we part I will have a big, young, white-man‟s horse, with a piece of paper signed by a white man. Even if other white men believe that a sheriff signed over the horse to me, some may not have reason to honor the deal.” He pointed his head when the mustang snorted and stomped a hoof. “No one will look twice at an Indian on an Indian pony.” Gideon thought Jed must have rocks in his head to think that he could go anywhere and people wouldn‟t look. He was fine and strong,

and he carried his strength around him like most people wore a warm coat. He was the kind of man people looked at—even people who didn‟t have the same kind of interest Gideon did, even when Jed tried to make himself seem like nothing much. Gideon might have thought that when he‟d first met Jed, injured and weak and feverish. He might have made the mistake of thinking it for a time after, even. But even if he hadn‟t seen what Jed had done to them marauders back in that shot-up camp, he couldn‟t look at Jed and see anything but a strong, independent, and solitary man. A man who knew how to take care of himself even when the odds were against him. “You don‟t leave here with folding money for this trade, I‟ll call you a fool to your face,” Gideon warned him. Jed‟s smile showed all his teeth, and Gideon returned it in kind. After Jed made the deal—and did indeed have more money in his pocket than any time Gideon had ever seen him—Jed asked the man for directions. “We don‟t need directions, Jed,” Gideon scoffed. “Straight west, follow the sun….” The livery man, Bob Grisham, laughed out loud. “If you want to get stuck in a bog or drown trying to cross all the inland bays up here, sure,” he said. “You got the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers up there, mister, and Suisun Bay, the Carquinez Strait—they all backflow when the Pacific tide comes in, and they‟re a pain in the ass on a good day.” “I‟ve been on a train from Sacramento to Oakland a dozen times or more, Mister Grisham,” Gideon said, rankled. “Ain‟t never had a problem.” Grisham shook his head. “On a train you wouldn‟t, but I‟m betting you don‟t know how many coolies died, laying those tracks back in the ‟60s and ‟70s. If you go south, you‟ll hit Stockton. After that you can go straight west just like you want to, and miss all the water.”

Jed raised an eyebrow at him. “Do you wish to swim to San Francisco, Gideon?” he asked. Gideon felt the flush heat his neck and grumbled, “How far‟s Stockton from here, then?” “Not more than fifteen miles,” Grishom replied. “It‟s the route I take when I have to go somewhere.” Under his breath he added, “It‟s the route everybody takes.” Gideon felt the flush heat him further, and Jed‟s superior little smile didn‟t help matters at all. “He‟s the guide,” he finally grumbled and tried hard not to stomp away from the livery. Jed caught up to him quick enough. “So stubborn,” he teased, and more quietly, “so young.” “I‟m twenty years old, Jed,” he groused. “I been a man for years now.” “Your parents coddle you,” Jed shot back. Gideon turned on him and planted his hands on his hips. “You tryin‟ to pick a fight?” “No,” Jed said softly. Softer still he said, “Perhaps I am trying to heat your blood, though.” This rush of heat, Gideon was powerless to stop, and it went south instead of north, curling in his belly and making his cock twitch. “We ain‟t leaving this town without a supper somebody else cooks,” he said, though all of a sudden he was in a hell of a hurry to get back on the road. Half an hour later they rode right into the huge, low disk of the sun, Gideon on Star and Jed on his new pony, turning south and putting the sun to their shoulders when they picked their way out of Lodi. Gideon had insisted that Jed buy him a hot dinner with some of his extra cash, and Jed, surprisingly, hadn‟t argued about it. But Gideon hadn‟t asked Jed to stay in town, in a bed, and Jed hadn‟t offered that. Tonight, Gideon wanted to be wherever Jed wanted to be, and they both knew it. The sun had dropped below the horizon before Jed turned off the road and found them a place by following a trickle of a stream. They

tramped through tall grasses turned brown by summer sun, and rode right into the edges of a copse of oak trees that grew tall on both sides of the creek banks. A bend in the stream had dug out the bed, and it was deep enough there for them to wash up—cold, mountain cold, that shriveled his little stallion and made his balls try to crawl up inside his body, but clean and clear and waist-deep when he waded in. Jed gathered wood while Gideon cleared dead leaves and twigs until a struck match showed him black, loamy earth, then he dragged handfuls of rocks from the creek‟s edge to scatter into the hole. He almost tripped into the little hole in the dark, which earned him a low chuckle from Jed. He‟d have glared at the man, if only there‟d been enough light for Jed to see it, but the moon wasn‟t up yet and the deepening dusk didn‟t penetrate the tree canopy, so Gideon didn‟t waste his time on the effort. Jed started the fire while Gideon unsaddled and tethered the horses and dragged their gear near, dropping it on the ground. He hadn‟t really expected a fire, since they‟d left the cooler night air at higher altitudes and had already eaten dinner, but Jed set out his pan and started coffee. Gideon rubbed his hands together, unaccountably eager, and held them out toward the heat, using that excuse to look at the man who squatted beside him. Jed looked like he usually did, serene and peaceful and self-contained, but there was something else there tonight that got Gideon‟s blood stirring: long, silent looks his way, and a set to Jed‟s mouth that Gideon wanted to kiss off him. He barely tasted the coffee when he drank it, because his attention was all on Jed. And Jed knew it. He wasn‟t being coy or dragging things out, but he was being purposeful. Every motion seemed steadier and more intent than the one before it, and Gideon felt his cock hardening before either of them said a word about laying out a bed. When Jed finally emptied his coffee cup, he rose tall and straight and grabbed up Gideon‟s bedroll, laying it out and folding the top over. Then he untied his own blanket, spread it out over Gideon‟s bedroll, and pulled it back. That looked mighty inviting, and with a quick glance Jed‟s way, Gideon pushed back to his feet and bent to tug off his boots then shrugged out of his coat.

Jed fell onto his backside, tin cup still in his hand, and looked up to watch him, which did all sorts of things to Gideon‟s insides. He was a showman at heart, but this didn‟t seem like the time for a performance, so he just watched Jed watching him, and kept stripping down, taking off his pants and, after a brief hesitation, skinning out of his underdrawers, too, to reveal his cock, already hard and seeking. He stood there, warm in California‟s autumn air, but a shiver coursed through him anyway, just from the way Jed‟s eyes took him in. “Lie down,” Jed said, and Gideon scrambled to the bedroll fast enough to earn a low chuckle from Jed. “So young,” he thought he heard Jed say, but the words floated between them quieter than most of Jed‟s chanting. “I‟m a grown man,” he shot back, more teasing than defensive this time. He reckoned Jedediah Buffalo Bird, of all the people in this world, knew just how much a man he was. “But you act like a child, in this,” Jed said, plenty loud enough for Gideon to hear this time. Oddly though, his words held no rancor, just more of that gentle teasing Jed seemed to like to do at his expense. Gideon couldn‟t complain, not when Jed rose and stripped down, smooth and easy. He was gratified to see that Jed‟s cock was hard, too, and his gaze got stuck on the end of that pretty length, where firelight caught a glimmer of fluid at the tip. Without a thought he sat up, reaching out to catch Jed by the back of one wiry, hard-muscled thigh. “Come here,” he murmured, pulling Jed toward him. Jed frowned but took two steps forward. It was close enough. Gideon slipped his tongue out to catch the clear bubble of fluid at the tip and sighed around the flesh when Jed‟s breath caught. One of Jed‟s hands eased through his hair, and for a second, Gideon thought Jed might pull him away. He pulled harder, trying to draw Jed closer, taking the head into his mouth. “Gideon,” Jed hissed, and his fingers started to tug, “you do not need to do this.” Gideon backed off long enough to say, “Oh, yes I do,” then dived back down on it.

Jed‟s cock fit his body, firm and straight and just big enough to fill Gideon‟s mouth well, and Gideon set up a slow sucking, sliding his lips down the shaft and back up, working hard to get a moan from the man. When it came, he lifted a hand and cupped Jed‟s balls, rolling them in their sac, and another little groan choked out of Jed, like he was struggling to hold it in. Hell, he probably was. Jed had a whole hell of a lot of self-restraint, more than Gideon would ever try and claim. But his hips started working, and Gideon relaxed, letting the shaft slide toward the back of his throat, resisting a groan or two himself at how good all of this was, how unique to his life so far. He‟d had more than his share of men, but to keep one over weeks like this, and such a good man— well, it let him know a little better why his mother and father had stayed together and happy for so long, because the familiarity, the knowing someone else‟s body and heart, too, made all of this so much better. Too soon, Jed tugged at his hair hard enough that Gideon had to let his head be pulled from its task. “What?” he asked, blinking as he savored how the firelight played shadows over Jed‟s form. “Lie down,” Jed said, and Gideon felt a shiver of anticipation slide through him. He didn‟t know what Jed was planning, but he‟d already learned that when Jed told him to do something in that tone of voice, the result was going to be good for them both. He stretched back, resisting the urge to take hold of his own aching shaft, and watched as Jed fished through their bags for the leftovers from dinner: sweet butter he‟d purchased at the restaurant, paying extra for the little tin, and Gideon sucked in a slow breath. Yeah, that‟d be good. That‟d be real good, out here in the quiet and peaceful night, with a fire burning bright enough that he could see what they were doing and remember it. When Jed straddled his thighs, he thought he knew how this was going to go, but instead of buttering him up, Jed curled over him and licked up his shaft, making him buck against Jed‟s weight across his legs. Jed, hands on their bedrolls to either side of Gideon‟s waist, looked up his body, all mysterious and foreign and intent. “I will take

you,” he said, more order than offer, and all the muscles in Gideon‟s body tightened at the words. “Yeah….” He swallowed, licked his lips. “Yeah, do that.” He followed where Jed‟s hand guided, rolling to his belly and watching the fire dance while Jed‟s strong hands worked at the dense muscles of his ass, kneading at the cheeks. Gideon thought he could come just from that touch, from anticipation, and from the way his cock rubbed against the rough fabric of his bedroll. But it felt like Jed was inside his head, because the kneading stopped, and Jed gripped his hips hard, lifting them a few inches off the ground. “Stop that,” Jed ordered, “or it will be over before it begins.” Gideon hissed a breath when he heard the tin lid scrape against the container, and he hissed again when one slender finger found and pressed into his hole. Jed had done that before, dry, but not with this plan in mind, and Gideon felt his cock pulse in time to his racing heart. “You don‟t hurry up, it‟ll be over before it starts, anyway,” he huffed out on a laugh. Everything he knew about the world told him this shouldn‟t be so good, but everything he knew about Jed rejected what he‟d learned before. His body felt hotter than that fire burning near, so that when one finger turned into two, and then Jed‟s weight settled along his back, Gideon felt like they‟d throw sparks between them. “Be ready,” Jed whispered, breath and long hair tickling his shoulder just before Gideon felt the snub, smooth head press against his hole. He was ready, more ready than he‟d ever been. But Jed didn‟t move, his body so still that Gideon couldn‟t even feel him breathing. “C‟mon in, Jed,” he whispered urgently. He wanted it, wanted the pressure and the burn and all the good that would follow. Jed tensed briefly, then a slow push came, pressing against his body, trying to open him up. He tightened instinctively, but before he could do anything about it, Jed murmured, “No, Gideon, let it happen.” It wasn‟t the words, but the layer of desperation in the other man‟s voice that got to Gideon. He turned his head, trying to see over his shoulder, wanting to see what that sort of need looked like on Jed‟s face, but Jed‟s hair hung down, hiding him.

Jed made a low noise as he pushed forward again, and the pressure on parts that hadn‟t felt it in too long made Gideon offer up some sounds of his own. The burn grew as the head of Jed‟s cock breached him, but Jed stopped before it overpowered Gideon‟s senses. “Good,” he gasped out, “feels good, keep going.” “Soon,” Jed said, the word more breath than sound against his skin. “Wait.” He didn‟t want to wait, he wanted to feel Jed all the way up inside him, wanted Jed to own him. It wasn‟t a startling realization. He knew already how deeply he cared for Jed, but he‟d never had this physical want as intensely as he did now, the want to be possessed by a man, just this way, belly-down in the dark, giving it all up and over. “You move or I will,” he warned, earning a huff of hot breath on his shoulder blade. “So young,” Jed breathed again, and pushed home, right on through. Gideon‟s body was all mixed up, and he had to work to keep it open, to push his ass back until he felt the full weight of Jed‟s hipbones against the cushion of his butt. It hurt, but it hurt good, better than anything he‟d felt in—maybe ever. He‟d had men inside him before, but it‟d never felt this good. It was like him and Jed were made for this, like Jed was supposed to be doing this, just this way. “Gideon,” Jed whispered, his body trembling like a leaf. Gideon could feel the tremors where their skin touched, from the backs of his thighs all the way to his shoulder where Jed‟s lips moved soundlessly against the flesh. “I—” “Don‟t,” Gideon said, gasping. “Move, Jed. Move.” Jed did. It was slow at first, as if he were scared but couldn‟t stop himself—which Gideon could understand. He forced himself to move, too, forward, away from Jed, until he felt the tug that warned of separation. Then he pushed back and was rewarded with a groan as Jed reseated himself deep, so deep, like he was in Gideon‟s heart and not just his ass. Gideon pulled forward again, and Jed groaned again, and the movement was smooth and sharp and energetic. Jed pushed forward, faster this time, and pulled back instead of stopping. Gideon

moved, too, but he was slower now, waiting to see what Jed would do—and Jed took control. It was deep and thorough, as if Jed were laying claim, taking possession of him in a way that no one else ever had—in a way Gideon had never invited anyone else to do. Every movement zinged through him, sparking heat and friction and a pulsing electricity that pushed him close to the edge, driving him up toward release. His cock felt too heavy, as if the weight of release was too much—but he knew that feeling wouldn‟t last long. His body was poised, ready to spring the release as soon as he dropped his guard. Jed didn‟t give him much chance to, though. A strong hand bruised at his hip as it worked underneath him, and Jed‟s sure touch to his cock shocked him, coursing through his whole body. One firm tug, two, and Gideon hoped to hell Jed had picked them a good spot and there wasn‟t a home over the next rise, because the yell he let out would have brought folks running. He couldn‟t help it, though, couldn‟t stop it—not the noise, not the gush of pleasure that geysered down and out of him, not the sudden furious pounding Jed gave him from behind, inside, all the way through him. His muscles went lax, trapping Jed‟s hand between him and his bedroll, and it was all he could do to breathe and come, breathe and come together, like every breath in made room for more pleasure to pour out. When Jed‟s hips stuttered and pushed home one last, harsh time, Gideon whimpered for it, for how well Jed fit him and how good it was. And because things this good weren‟t meant to last. He was mourning his losses before his cock stopped spitting, and surely before Jed‟s did, slicking him up inside and making him squeeze his muscles to hold everything right where it was, right in this surfeit of sensation and feeling. Jed couldn‟t convince him this was just how men were. Gideon knew how men were, because he was one, hornier and more determined to get his satisfaction than most. This was more than that, and Jed could talk himself hoarse denying it, and Gideon wouldn‟t believe a word. He lay there, limp as a dishrag, while echoes of pleasure arced through him, and he felt held together by nothing more than the steady weight of Jed‟s body on his.

“Gideon,” Jed whispered after a time. He sounded weak as a kitten, but from somewhere he found the strength to pull up and out. Their parting made a wet sound, and it hurt, but not in his ass, not to speak of. Separating from Jed took more out of him, like breath but deeper in his chest. Jed pushed himself up and away and made as if to rise, but Gideon rolled awkwardly onto his side and reached out, catching one of Jed‟s wrists. “You got no reason to move,” he mumbled, working hard to make his mouth move right. “I want to look around,” Jed said, sounding nervous. “You were loud.” Gideon huffed a breath of tired laughter. “That, I was,” he agreed. “Your fault,” he added smugly, grinning when Jed shook his head in annoyance. He almost expected some kind of comment about his age again. But he thought the same thing Jed did about how loud he‟d been, so he gathered up the strength to push up on one elbow while Jed pulled on his clothes. “Wait here,” Jed said, which was all Gideon needed to move. “I‟ll go with you.” “You will slow me down.” Gideon refused to take offense. He‟d taken offense in Carson City, and wasted time they didn‟t have. Maybe he would slow Jed down, but he‟d be lonely if Jed wandered away right now, and as long as they were both presentable, it didn‟t matter how slow the going was anyway. “Best to work out some of the stiffness before it sets in,” he said, offering a reason to walk with him, and Jed tossed him a worried frown. “I‟m fine—better than fine. Still,” he added, bending carefully, “you could‟ve told me you were this good at that.” Jed‟s frown melted into confusion. “I am… I….” Gideon chuckled, pleased to see the man so discombobulated. “We‟d have been doing it a lot sooner if I‟d known.” Jed shook his head and looked down as he tied up his pants. “I thought you liked the other way better.”

Gideon pulled on his own pants, thinking long before he answered truthfully, “I like it almost any way you want to do it, Jed. Don‟t know that I‟d ever have thought that about another guy, but I guess you taught me something new.” Jed stared at him for a few seconds before nodding. He didn‟t say anything else, just slipped on his boots instead and walked away. Gideon hurried to catch up before he lost him in the dark. They didn‟t take long, stumbling around a circuit of the camp— well, Gideon supposed he did most of the stumbling, because Jed was better at dealing with the dark than he was, but at least Gideon didn‟t run into any trees. As sated and dozy as he was feeling, he could have. Jed led the way while they both listened for anything that shouldn‟t be there—voices, footsteps not their own, rustling in the dry grass. After a time, when Gideon was good and cold, Jed turned and headed back toward the fire. Gideon walked along behind him, enjoying the ache in his ass. He‟d be sore tomorrow, but it was a good sore, one he could live with. One he didn‟t like the idea of living without, in fact. Riding wouldn‟t be particularly pleasant, but then, maybe that‟d slow them down a little. He liked the idea of that. They got back to camp, and Jed went straight to their bedrolls, pulling his blankets off the top of Gideon‟s and moving to put them on the other side of the fire. “Hold up, now,” Gideon protested. “You put them blankets right back where they were.” “It is not cold enough to warrant sharing blankets,” Jed said, and he had a stubborn look on his face that told Gideon he wasn‟t the only one affected by what they‟d done tonight. He slid around behind Jed and put his hands to the narrow hips, just holding them. “Let‟s say it is.” Jed stiffened, ready to resist him, but Gideon plowed on before Jed could get all reasonable. “What are we, two days out of San Francisco? Three, if we dally? And I intend to, now,” he added honestly. “The road‟s only gonna get more crowded from here, Jed, and I want to lie with you.”

“You always get what you want?” Jed asked, and Gideon heard the frown in his voice. “Nope,” he said easily, “but when I can? I try.” He stepped up close, pressing his body against Jed‟s warmth and setting his chin atop Jed‟s shoulder. He had to tilt his head up to do it—Jed wasn‟t that small—but it was worth it, to smell his hair and feel him through the layers of their clothes. “No good reason not to, and this could be the last night we‟ve got that‟s this private.” Jed‟s shoulder slumped, in acknowledgment or surrender, and he tugged gently away. Gideon let him, watching to see what he‟d do and gratified when he tromped, sullenly enough that Gideon thought he could do some teasing of his own, back around the fire and laid his blanket back down beside Gideon‟s. Gideon hopped to, getting his boots off and shrugging back out of his coat, and when he lay down, Jed joined him without a word. Both of them faced the fire, and Gideon wasn‟t ashamed of his urge to prop up and look down at Jed‟s profile in the flickering light, to card his fingers through Jed‟s hair and pull it back, revealing more of him. He wanted to say some words, but after what they‟d done tonight, words seemed mighty inadequate to the task of description. So he bent and planted a kiss in Jed‟s hair, and finally settled back behind him. He slept well and hard.

GIDEON woke to the feel of Jed trying to ease out from under his arm. “Mmnn,” he mumbled, and cleared his throat. “You tryin‟ to slip off?” he asked, sated and warm and teasing, mostly. “No,” Jed said, frowning at him, and Gideon drew up short, propping on an elbow to blink around their little camp. He‟d remember this place for a long time, he knew, but it wouldn‟t be a story he ever told, not even to another man, when there was one. “I reckon I could find my way on into San Francisco from here, couldn‟t I?” he asked. Jed huffed. “A child could.”

“Well, you accuse me of being one often enough,” he said, smiling to take any sting out of the words. “But that don‟t mean I don‟t expect you to get me all the way there. Jed….” He sighed, thinking again about how words didn‟t seem up to the task before him. “I know we‟re close to the end of the road, all right? And I know you‟ll be turning around and going home, after. But don‟t slip off, okay? Don‟t slip off when I‟m expecting to see you in the morning. I think it‟d break my heart.” Jed rolled under his arm, stretching out flat on his back, and frowned up at him. “Gideon,” he started, and sighed. “I will not leave before we reach your destination,” he said, and Gideon wondered what he‟d started to say. There was no sense asking him. Jed would just shut up tighter than a clam, and that would be that. “Time to go?” he asked instead. “It is early yet,” Jed said, calmer now. “I thought I would fish.” “No need,” Gideon reminded him. “We‟ll find plenty of wide spots in the road between here and Stockton. We can eat food somebody else cooks.” Jed frowned at him, looking honestly curious. “You truly prefer food other people have cooked.” “Well,” Gideon said, thinking about it, “I guess I just like variety. Meals that ain‟t always one dish with too little salt and seasonings. Most times, that means somebody else‟s cooking. The show‟s head cook, she‟s real good. Kind of like a restaurant cook I guess, ‟cause she and her team are cooking for three hundred hungry people. You ought to try her food before you head home,” he said. “If we have not missed them,” Jed said, but Gideon heard the doubt in his voice and didn‟t push. He wasn‟t so sure he wanted to share Jed anyway, not even with his folks. His ma would ask questions, and he‟d want to answer them, and he thought the telling of this tale, so close to Jed‟s leaving, would just make their parting feel worse than he already knew it would. “If it‟s early yet, and we ain‟t in much of a hurry,” he tried, and slid his hand over Jed‟s flat belly, “I sure would be happy to suck you off right this very minute.”

Jed blanched. “I have not washed.” Gideon grimaced, remembering, and chuckled a little. “Okay, you‟ve got a little bit of a point there. So, what then?” He was rubbing circles over the hollow of Jed‟s belly, from the end of his ribs to the pointed hip bones, firmly enough that the fabric of Jed‟s shirt traveled with his hand. “So, we walk,” Jed answered, and with a brief squeeze to Gideon‟s hand, he slithered out from under it and rolled to his feet. Gideon couldn‟t complain. He could honestly say that he was still all soft and sated from last night, even though he already missed the feel of Jed‟s body against him. He lay there and watched Jed walk to the far side of the camp and away, into the trees. First piss of the day, he thought, which finally motivated him enough to stand. Ouch. As he sat up, he felt sharp twinges, not just inside but all through his lower back, reminding him of how eager he‟d been, how much he‟d bucked underneath Jed last night. It wasn‟t painful, but it was distracting, and he groaned a little as he got to his feet, then he groaned a little more as he followed Jed‟s path into the trees. He‟d ridden horses since he was big enough to climb up on one from a step or a fence, and he was in fine form, but however he‟d moved last night had stretched him different, and he was more sore than he‟d expected. Walking helped, and he bent to stretch the backs of his legs as he tucked himself back into his pants. The movement brought another sharp pain through his lower back, and he hissed, turning this way and that to try and loosen the pull. He was still stiff when he came back to the camp, enough that Jed stood up from where he was putting his pack in order. “Are you hurt?” he asked, and Gideon was pleased to note the worry in his voice. “Nothing I can‟t handle,” he said, but he hissed as he started to bend over to gather up his own bedroll. “Gideon….” Jed sighed just like he had earlier, and stepped up as Gideon turned to look at him. “Lie down.” “What?”

Jed smiled a little. “It is not often that I have to ask you that twice. Lie down. On your stomach.” Much as it would cost him in comfort, Gideon perked up at the idea. “Yeah, that‟s—” Jed shook his head and shot Gideon an annoyed look. “Just lie down.” “All right, all right!” He stretched out carefully, propping his chin on his fist. “But if you think you‟re gonna—” “Be quiet.” He huffed a breath but closed his mouth. When strong hands started kneading at the muscles in his lower back, he opened it again. “Oh, that‟s good,” he groaned, “that‟s—yeah, right there.” “Are you able to do anything without narrating it?” Jed asked, and Gideon thought it was a joke until the annoyance in Jed‟s voice registered. He started to answer before he realized that shutting up was maybe the goal Jed had in mind, and went back to clamping his jaw tight. Still, the little groans of pleasure worked their way out, and if Jed didn‟t like it, he could lump it. This felt too good, and the ache in his muscles drained off him like water. Jed‟s hands moved down, kneading his ass cheeks like a good baker kneaded bread dough, so that the hurt and the relief combined to confuse his body to no end. His balls itched like they did when something was starting to work him up, and he humped up against Jed‟s hands then settled more deeply against the bedroll. Decades of leaves made this ground almost as soft as a mattress, and he fisted his hands and just wallowed in the comfort, ignoring the itch as Jed moved to one side and worked his way down the back of one leg, then up the other. Finally, with a light swat to his backside, Jed said, “That should help.” “Mmm hmm,” he mumbled, thinking he could go right back to sleep for another hour, if only Jed would stretch out beside him. It occurred to him that he hadn‟t seen Jed nap during the day since he‟d recovered from the fever and infection back in Livingston. And while he was in no hurry to start moving again, he reckoned that his chances of a lie-in were low.

“All right,” he muttered, and pushed up to his hands and knees. “Quick wash in a cold creek, then we head out.” “All right,” Jed replied. Gideon barely splashed his hands and face, thinking he could maybe get a hot bath in a town somewhere along the road today, but he did squat by the creek to watch when Jed stripped off all his clothes and washed thoroughly. I could suck him now, and he‟d just taste like Jed. So he set to doing it, putting himself between Jed and the clothes he‟d spread out on a branch. “Hey,” he said, looking up from where he knelt. Jed frowned at him. “Come here.” “We should get moving.” “And we will, just as soon as I do this.” He scooted forward on his knees when Jed made no move to close the distance between them, and reached to put his hands on Jed‟s hips, taking a moment just to look at his manhood. It was already starting to thicken, even after that cold water. “He wants it,” Gideon said, grinning up at Jed. Jed frowned all the harder, but he didn‟t try to pull away, so Gideon used his tongue to tease at the loose skin covering the crown, then sucked the cold shaft in. It didn‟t take but a minute for Jed to get all the way hard in his mouth, and Gideon used his hands to guide Jed‟s hips, starting an easy thrusting motion. Jed‟s hands touched his shoulders briefly before they curled up, one around the back of his neck and one sliding into his hair. “Gideon,” Jed said on a sigh. He was sighing a lot more since the Hennessey homestead, but this time the sound was filled with need. Gideon smiled around the cock in his mouth, lingering at the crown when Jed pulled away a few inches. The tip delivered a drop of bitter fluid, and he licked it like a lollipop before going back down, all the way. The hands at his neck and in his hair tightened, reflex motions that warmed Gideon right down to his own cock, which he manfully ignored. A piece of him wanted to pull it out, jerk himself off while he did this, but the greater part wanted to remember this, wanted every detail for cold and lonely nights to come. Hot and smooth, all man,

tasting woodsy and natural and clean, topped with that bitter taste at the tip that he kept pausing to lick off. Jed was getting close, he could tell just from how tightly the man held himself, so he pulled back and off Jed‟s manhood to look up at his face. “Let go, Jed. You ain‟t gonna hurt me.” “I don‟t—I do not….” “I do,” Gideon said firmly, and sucked the shaft back in. It seemed like Jed wound himself even tighter, so Gideon slid one hand over a narrow ass cheek, seeking with a fingertip until he found the pucker. His other hand, he slid in between Jed‟s legs from the front, rolling the tight balls in their sac, and it seemed like he‟d found the combination that would make Jed cut loose. Both hands went to the sides of his head, giving him what he‟d been wanting for minutes now, and Gideon tightened his lips around the shaft and let go himself, tonguing the underside as it slid into and out of his mouth, urging Jed on with grunts and the finger pressed into him from behind. That‟s it, he thought, as hungry for this as Jed was. That‟s it…. Jed actually let loose a garbled shout when he came, startling Gideon so bad he almost fell backward onto his ass. He caught his balance by grabbing Jed‟s hips again and held on through the shuddering, swallowing around the head of Jed‟s cock and moaning his satisfaction at a job well done. When Jed‟s hands tugged at his ears to pull him off, he knelt back and grinned. “Ain‟t such a bad way to start the day now, is it?” Jed just looked at him for a long moment, naked and glowing in the dappled morning light, and reached a fingertip to trace Gideon‟s lips. He knelt in front of Gideon and kissed him, and Gideon felt like whatever inhibitions Sioux had against the act of kissing, Jed had clearly overcome them. His tongue went everywhere, seeking out the taste of himself or of Gideon or both, and Gideon relaxed into it, struggling not to just surrender to this assault and fall back into the leaves. “I can do for you now,” Jed said when he pulled back, and Gideon sat there and watched Jed‟s eyes search him as thoroughly as his tongue just had. “You could,” he said, “but I c‟n wait ‟til we bed down tonight.”

Jed looked around their little campsite, and a tiny frown marred the sated, tender look on his face. “I do not know that we will find a camp away from other white men,” he said slowly. “Well,” Gideon said, pushing to his feet and adjusting his hard cock in his pants, “I guess you‟ve got good cause to, now.” Jed‟s frown deepened. “You are trying to manipulate me.” “I think I just did manipulate you,” he teased, touching a finger to Jed‟s softening cock. “Very funny,” Jed said dryly, like he was trying to criticize. But he couldn‟t pull it off, naked and flushed, and the idea that he was trying so hard made Gideon loose a full-throated laugh. “You don‟t gotta be so buttoned up all the time, Jed,” he said. “If you can‟t find us a good place to repeat that performance, well, it‟s your loss. Or I ain‟t as good at what I just did as I thought I was.” Jed‟s chuckle was low and throaty, but he didn‟t say a word as he edged around Gideon to gather up his clothes. Neither one of them spoke as they packed up their gear, readied their horses, and picked their way back to the road. Gideon did say a choice word or two when he mounted and a sharp twinge of pain shot through his ass, and he grumbled for a while afterward, but Jed, after offering a concerned look or two that Gideon waved away, mostly grinned at him. They rode for a while, but the slow pace that they started with didn‟t waver much. Gideon didn‟t complain, not just because of his own discomfort but because he was glad of the extra time with Jed. They stopped for breakfast and coffee at the first wide spot in the road they came across, and Jed encouraged him to walk a little after. It amused him that Jed walked with him, leading his horse along like Gideon did. “You gonna sell that horse when we part?” he asked. “Why would I?” “Well,” Gideon shrugged, “all the noise you made about horses slowing a man down….” Jed shrugged. “He is an Indian pony. I will return him to Montana and then decide.”

“You gonna keep him on your reservation?” “No.” The one word, harder than Gideon had expected, got Gideon thinking. “Do you live on a reservation?” “No. But I do not believe a man or beast should be confined to a place not its own.” “I like the sound of that,” he said, meaning it. Star‟s place was with him. She‟d been birthed into his hands and raised up from a wobbling colt with him teaching her right from wrong. Maybe this pony‟s place would be with Jed, by the time Jed got it back to Montana. “You ought to give it a name.” “I have,” Jed said, surprising him. “Sunkdudan.” “What‟s that mean?” “Short-legged pony.” Gideon snorted. “What you suffer from, Jed, is a lack of imagination.” Jed shrugged. “That is what he is. Just like your horse. She is the star of your show.” Gideon blinked. Those were pretty much his daddy‟s words, that she‟d be a star if he took proper care of her. He couldn‟t recall having told Jed that story, which made the man‟s assumption all the sweeter. “Sort of,” he said, without offering any more explanation. Jed didn‟t ask for one. The trees had thinned out a little as they came out of the mountains, but plenty of the north-facing hillsides in this rolling country were dotted with stands of oaks, the short and stubby kind that grew hardy and slow in this dryer climate, and whole crowds of them dotted rivers and streams. They stopped for lunch by a stand of willows, letting the horses feed on grass and drink water from the stream they‟d been following. Gideon sat back in the sun, letting his mind drift as his body relaxed. The ache inside wasn‟t so bad now, but it was nice to be still and to be warm. Nice to feel those aches that reminded him of Jed.

Movement beside him drew him out of a drowse and he looked up to see Jed openly watching him. The frown on Jed‟s features made him think it was time to start moving again, but as he gathered himself to rise, Jed turned and dropped into a sit beside him, his legs bent at the knee and his ankles crossed almost under his butt. “Time to move on?” he asked anyway. Jed reached out a hand, patting his knee. “Not yet.” Gideon tilted his head, listening for any sounds that shouldn‟t be here, or the noise of horses or people, but all he could hear was the birds in the trees and the breeze in the grasses. “Time for something else?” he asked hopefully, and it looked like Jed was trying to frown at him for the suggestion, but couldn‟t quite make his mouth do it. “My father was a good storyteller, like you,” Jed said out of the blue. “He would tell us stories, when we were small, of the way the land was before the white men came. His father and his grandfather could walk the land for three days in almost any direction, if they wished, and never see sign of another Indian, much less a white man.” “Feel like we did that, too,” Gideon said, “when we were east of the Sierra Nevada.” Jed chuckled. “We walked white men‟s trails, Gideon. We followed white men‟s train tracks and crossed white men‟s bridges. And we were rarely three days from some white settlement, even though they might have been difficult for you to find.” Gideon shrugged, accepting. He was thirsty for details, for knowledge he could hold on to about this man who‟d come to mean so much. “What else did your daddy do?” “He was born on the reservation, but his father was not. My father learned the old ways, and he and my grandfather taught them to us. He taught us to hunt and fish, to be as one with the land, to honor all the creatures that Earth Mother created. Grandfather said that even white men had a place here, a reason for being.” Jed pulled his knees up and wrapped his arms around them, staring so thoughtfully at Gideon that Gideon felt mesmerized by those night-blue eyes. “But my father told

us never to trust them, that even with the best of intentions, white men cannot honor the ways of our people.” “Reckon plenty of us are pretty ignorant,” Gideon said slowly. He didn‟t like talking white folks down, but he wasn‟t going to ignore the evidence of his own eyes, neither. Besides, his friends in the show like Harold Crowe had called folks like Bill and the troupe exceptions to the rule. Jed nodded. “Even your teachers—at least the missionaries who taught us—are ignorant. They believed they were teaching us better ways, but really they only taught us white ways: whites believe the Earth has no soul, that she exists to be conquered and used and that she will always provide plenty. Yet through my father‟s eyes I have seen the buffalo disappear, and the wolf, and the way your mining for metal can poison the rivers and kill the fish.” Jed turned his face away, gaze rising toward the afternoon sky, but his hand returned to Gideon‟s knee and rested there. “You asked me about my school.” He hugged his legs closer but his voice was even as he went on. “We learned many things from the white teachers, Gideon, but the thing I learned best is that my father was right. The white man is uncompromising and unforgiving. You may not intend to be, but it is in your nature. For my people, to trust in your kind is to die a little. Or a lot.” The words were hard—not the tone, because Jed‟s voice stayed as even and gentle as it had been through the entire telling. But Gideon knew that the story was more than a piece of Jed‟s history. It was Jed‟s explanation for why nothing could be between them. He took a breath, wanting to say something, but he knew that telling the man he was flat-out wrong wouldn‟t get him very far. Nobody liked hearing that, and it didn‟t matter one whit what color their skin was. Jed rose and turned to look down at him. “We should go. We are not far now, and you may find that your companions have waited for you.” Gideon chuckled at that; Bill Tourney didn‟t wait for anybody, not when money was on the line, and he sent advance teams up the

road, men and women to put up posters and spread the word. Jed reached out a hand, offering to help Gideon up, and Gideon let him. But as he came to his feet, ignoring the protest of his muscles, he stepped in close to Jed, letting their bodies touch. “I‟m real sorry for the way things are between our peoples,” he said, slipping an arm around Jed‟s waist. “But I‟m not sorry for the way things are between you and me. I‟m not looking forward to leaving you.” Jed sighed again, but he squeezed Gideon‟s hand before pulling away. Gideon held the silence for a mile or more, chewing over what Jed had said. It wasn‟t all wrong, but it wasn‟t all right either. “Jed,” he started a ways down the road, “you‟re making a mistake there.” Jed looked around himself. “Where?” Gideon waved an annoyed hand. It wasn‟t like he‟d ever been accused of waiting too long to talk. “That story you told me. You think that white folks are like the white God, that there‟s only one of ‟em and only one way they can be. But that‟s like saying all Indians are the same, and I‟ve already met enough of ‟em, from enough different tribes, to know that ain‟t true.” “You are more the same than you are different.” “Then how does that explain you and me?” he asked, dogged on that point. “You ain‟t seen me disrespect you or your ways, have you?” Jed frowned at him. “Every day, Gideon,” he said. “You are like a child, you do not even know what you do.” “Then you‟d best teach me fast,” Gideon said heartily, “if we ain‟t got much time left together.” Jed blinked surprise, like he‟d never thought of that before, and Gideon smiled, reining Star close enough to Jed‟s pony that he could lean over and pat Jed‟s thigh. “See? Some of us are plenty teachable and happy to learn new ways.” “Many of you seem to think so,” Jed said. Gideon snorted, shaking his head. And Jed called him stubborn.

Chapter 10

THEY traveled on, but as with the morning, the pace was slow and easy, a lot of walking mixed in with the riding. And talking. Gideon thought Jed must‟ve said more words today than he had on the whole trip to date. To hear Jed actually talking, pointing out things about the land here in California, dredging up bits of Indian mysticism—it fascinated Gideon. He‟d had little call to appreciate the “white God,” as Jed persisted in calling Him, but he‟d heard other Indian legends, and enjoyed them. He thought he could come to like most of the gods of Jed‟s people, too. They reminded him of folks in the show, and there were enough of them that it seemed like they‟d provide a merry old time around a campfire or interfering with the ways of mortal folks. The more Jed told him, the more he thought of the gods of Olympus, the myths and legends of an era before Jesus. The Sioux had their nature goddess, like the Greeks‟ Artemis, and mother earth, and if he tried he felt like he could map most of the animal spirits onto other gods. Loki, a crafty fox, could easily have been Hermes. Haokah, their god of the hunt, could have been Artemis—or if they needed him to be a fella, her brother Ares, the Greek god of war. The stories made him wonder if them gods of old hadn‟t been as real to the folks who lived in the old world as Jed‟s gods were to him. He‟d always thought of ‟em as campfire tales, and that the God who was Jesus‟s father had been around running things since before time began. Jed‟s stories brought home to him in a way that Harold Crowe and his kin‟s showmanship never had, just how deep an Indian‟s faith in the land—and its spirits—

could really run. Made him wonder about his own faith, or lack of it, that seemed to fit right well with many other members of the show. Back when Gideon was a boy, Bill Tourney had told him that if you traveled for a living, you had to be more open-minded, and more forgiving of the ways folks learned when they‟d been born, grew up, and planned to die all on the same patch of land. He‟d taken that to heart and seen the different ways people worshiped God, heard the different ways they believed in Him, and he‟d mostly been fine with all of it. This wealth of characters, and the awe Jed spoke of them with, they caught the storyteller in him, and it seemed like they tried to answer more questions about the world around them. He could see the appeal of them. As they rode and walked and talked, they ran across more people, too. They weren‟t on a wide road, but Gideon could tell it was leading up to one, just from the traffic. There were more houses around, too, more smoke swirling lazily from chimneys, and the sound of distant children‟s laughter mixing in with the calls of the birds. It wasn‟t constant. They could still go for long stretches with nothing but the sound of their own voices and the gurgle of a stream, but compared to the weeks they‟d spent through Montana, Idaho, and Nevada, having folks around felt good to the people lover in Gideon. Bill‟s words were close to mind, about being tolerant of people, and he wondered if these folk were the kind that would listen to Jed‟s stories with pleasure, or skepticism, or outright disdain. If Jed would even tell them, which he probably wouldn‟t. They hit Stockton before lunch, but Gideon didn‟t see that as a reason not to eat in a restaurant, and he paid this time. “I‟ve been through here with the show,” he told Jed. “Played out near that stock yard we passed, not far from the railroad station.” “Did the show play here on this trip?” Jed asked. “Probably,” Gideon said. “Stockton always drew a big crowd, so I reckon they came inland before they headed on to San Francisco.” There might be a flyer around somewhere, or he could ask the waitress when she swung back by.

“No matter,” Jed said, even though he was clearly curious. “You will find them soon, now.” They got back on the road before the sun reached its zenith, and turned west. The afternoon went as the morning had, and Gideon secretly worried that Jed would turn up hoarse, he was talking so much. But Gideon hung on every word, storing it away: the poverty of the reservation; his mother‟s black eyes; the joy of his first hunt with his father, elder brother, and uncle; how his mother and aunt had taught him to cook; what he‟d liked about Laramie—that took some teasing, to draw those details out of Jed. Gideon thought Jed might like a bigger city. Laramie was about the same size as Livingston, and towns that size were harder to get lost in. Gideon had always found big cities to be more cosmopolitan, where neighbors tended to leave their neighbors in peace. “Tourist towns are good,” he volunteered, “but big cities are better.” He talked a little about Chicago, Kansas City, St. Louis, and other places he knew from his own experience. “They‟re used to all kinds of folks visiting, and they‟re real friendly.” Jed looked dubious, but Gideon didn‟t mind. He was used to that look after all this time, and it wasn‟t like he was ever going to have a chance to prove his words. That thought made him quiet, and when Jed finally ran down, he started singing, hyunh-hya-hyunh-huh, the familiar chorus mixed in with other words Gideon didn‟t know. He let himself breathe to the rhythm of Jed‟s chanting, and the practice soothed him some. They stopped well before dusk at a place set back off the road and a good ways from the creek. Jed made up the camp, starting a fire and walking out a perimeter while Gideon unsaddled the horses and got them set for the evening. The Indian pony eyed him warily, but he didn‟t try to pull free like he had the first night, and he didn‟t try to bite. Maybe he was getting used to Gideon—or maybe he was getting used to Star. Whatever the case, he settled down well enough when Gideon brushed him down and tied him on a long lead near Star. By the time he got back to the camp, Jed had a fire going, coffee brewing, and fish baking. The smell of it wasn‟t particularly appetizing,

but the sight of Jed bent over the fire was welcome and familiar… and there wouldn‟t be many more of those sights. He looked away only to smile at the sight of their bedrolls lying side by side. “It will be a cool night,” Jed said. “I thought we could share heat—but I think that is all.” He said the last softly, and when Gideon nodded, he seemed relieved. Not that Gideon didn‟t want what he‟d given Jed that morning or what Jed had given him the night before. But he was happy with having Jed close. He‟d figured it out, finally, that fucking, he could find. This thing with Jed, he hadn‟t never found before. As he banked the fire and pulled off his boots, he watched Jed fussing with the covers of their shared bed before settling into it. They wouldn‟t have many more nights like this. Lonesomeness moved him over to the bedroll, and he eased onto it, watching Jed all the while. Jed had stretched out on his back, his hair spread out around his head like a dark, soft pillow. He had pulled the blankets up to his chin, and his eyes were closed, but his body was tense. “You cold?” Gideon asked. “No. Yes,” Jed said. Gideon smiled. Likely not, but likely, too, was the fact that Jed didn‟t trust him one whit, not even after all this traveling together. “I‟ll miss a repeat performance of last night or this mornin‟,” he whispered, “but I like the idea of just holding on to you, too.” That got Jed‟s eyes open, and a wary look crossed his face. Gideon had to wonder, really, which one of them Jed wasn‟t trusting here. He lay there and let his eyes drift between Jed‟s quiet face and the little fire Jed had built, and his mind drifted, too, back over the highlights and low points of this trip. Seeing Jed stumble into Livingston, burning up with fever… seeing the heart in the man as he licked that infection and stood on wobbly legs after long days on his back, sweating and in pain… that first night when Jed had let him know his secret desire wasn‟t a secret at all—that made him pause to wonder just what else Jed had heard him say. More than most men, because when he‟d thought Jed was at death‟s door he‟d shared some things he rarely told anybody. Right now, Gideon was glad of it. He was glad

that Jed liked him, too, glad that Jed liked all that they got up to together on dark nights near empty roads. Moira Hennessey‟s face came to mind, not fearful and shocky like when they‟d first met her, but when she‟d been tending her husband‟s body before they‟d put him in the ground. There‟d been so much love there, and so much loss—Gideon reckoned that was the moment he‟d truly realized that he had something similar he was about to lose, in Jed. Not kids, not a home, but… a life, maybe. Someone he‟d be happy to cleave to. Gideon sighed. His mother had always said she hoped he‟d find someone he‟d love half as much as she loved his daddy, but even she wouldn‟t wish this on him. Not with somebody he could never keep. Not with a man at all. She‟d whispered about grandchildren more than once in recent years, and he‟d been grateful every time his daddy had shushed her. Maybe his daddy knew him better than he‟d let on. Or maybe his daddy just believed that children ought to come from love, and not because a mother wanted grandbabies. Besides, his younger brother was married already, and his oldest sister was sixteen now, and when he‟d left the show in Montana she‟d been keeping company with Johnny Wilson, a nice young bronc rider who‟d joined the show two years past. Grace and Johnny would give his mama them grandbabies, if Ronald and his new bride didn‟t get ‟round to it first. Gideon might, too, one day. Maybe if he was lucky, he‟d find a good woman to feel for the way he felt for Jedediah. If he was real lucky, she might love him back the way Jed seemed to, for all that the man tried to deny it. He‟d always been lucky, and he knew it. Even lying here, holding something he knew he‟d be letting go of soon, he didn‟t regret a minute of it. His ma had taught him that, never to waste time regretting the wonderful things life brought by you, even if they were brief. “You should sleep, Gideon,” Jed said, startling him out of his musings. “I thought you already were,” he admitted, and rubbed his hand over Jed‟s belly. Jed seemed to like the touch, and it gave Gideon great comfort to offer it.

“No. I have been listening to the noise in your head.” Gideon snorted. “Come on now, Jed, I ain‟t even breathed loud.” “You have,” Jed said, and finally opened his eyes. The pupils were big and black in the firelight, the midnight blue irises a thin ring around them. “You have sighed many times.” Gideon shrugged. “Just thinking,” he said. “Thinking I ain‟t looking forward to San Francisco at all, and it used to be one of my favorite cities west of the Mississippi.” “It is what you have been aiming for since we left Montana,” Jed said, thoughtful and quiet. “Yeah, but you‟ll turn around and go back.” He sighed. “Wish we could stay with each other,” he admitted, feeling willful for saying it, but with Jed lying here all comfortable and relaxed beside him, and after all they‟d done and been for each other, he had the right. Jed‟s teeth caught the glinting firelight when he smiled. “You are so young.” Gideon frowned at him. “So?” “And stubborn. Headstrong. Selfish, seeking to satisfy your own desires.” Gideon resisted the urge to whap him on the belly. “So?” he said again. “So, I will miss this, too,” Jed said softly, and closed his eyes again.

THEY woke before the sun rose behind the now-distant mountains, and Gideon moved stiffly in the chill air. He‟d been feeling and smelling it for a day now, even this far inland: the Pacific Ocean and all the salt water in San Francisco Bay. Or maybe it was that they weren‟t as far inland as he wished they were. At the first town they came across, he stepped into the newspaper office to look at a map. They‟d reached Discovery Bay, no more than a wide spot in the road, just as the sun had peeked over the mountains behind them, and the big map of the

State of California that was pieced together along one wall told him what his heart already knew; they‟d be in Oakland tomorrow night. That was where Bill Tourney camped the show and where he played in these parts, and where they‟d be playing now, if they were still in town. They‟d barely covered twenty-five miles yesterday, across easy roads. Jed was dragging it out. “Long day,” Jed said, confirming his thoughts. “We must walk slowly.” If Gideon didn‟t count the regular satisfaction they found in each other‟s bodies, he thought he might miss Jed‟s dry sense of humor most of all. Lord knew, it had taken him long enough to learn to recognize it. They reached Walnut Creek that night, but for once Gideon didn‟t want to see any other people. “We can camp.” “We could sleep on a roof more easily, board the horses, let them eat grain,” Jed countered, so they did that instead, paying for board and feed for the animals, sharing a silent meal at a restaurant the livery manager recommended, then slipping late up a ladder and spreading their bedrolls over the shingled roof of a bank. They were too close to people to be together, but Jed slept near enough that Gideon could smell the scent of him. It carried into his dreams, and he woke knowing that he was going to miss that scent for the rest of his life.

THE sun woke Gideon early the next morning, but not before Jed. Gideon propped up on an elbow to look down at him, and decided the man was feigning sleep. He had to be, because the sun had crept up almost to the horizon already. Gideon felt a smile stretch his lips and touched Jed‟s arm, felt his smile broaden when Jed blinked his eyes open, alert, like he‟d been lying there waiting for that touch. Unlike the last few days, they didn‟t talk at all as they rolled up blankets and bedrolls, gathered up their bags, and climbed down off the roof. But Gideon found himself watching Jed, filing away his images for the future. Oftentimes when he looked, he found Jed looking back, and he thought that maybe Jed was doing the same, storing up

memories. They ate breakfast in silence, too, and Gideon thought he should compliment the fine cooking, but he just didn‟t care that much. It wasn‟t until they were mounted up, and they‟d left Walnut Creek behind them that Gideon said, “Last day,” voicing words that Jed must be thinking, too. “Yes,” Jed said. “You‟ll like the hotel,” Gideon told him. “They take all kinds of people, and treat ‟em all the same. That‟s part of why Bill always lets us put up there.” Jed didn‟t say anything. It wasn‟t far from Walnut Creek to Oakland, but it seemed like Oakland was moving out to meet them. Within just a few miles the road got wider and busier, with far more people than they‟d seen so far on this trip, and it seemed like every time he turned around he saw a stretch of new fence or a church steeple rising up in the distance. Where he might have sped up on any other trip, feeling this close to family and his roving home, Gideon found himself slowing down now, moving to the pace of the farmers headed to and from wide, flat fields. This was less the bustle of folks getting somewhere and more of folks walking the steady, plodding pace of people who worked from sunup to sunset. Jed didn‟t seem to be in any hurry either, and they took their time over lunch, sitting off the road and munching on biscuits with bacon that they‟d saved from breakfast. Gideon smiled as Jed brushed crumbs from his shirt and thighs, a motion he‟d grown so familiar with that he‟d stopped noticing it weeks back. “You‟ll fit right in at the Shady View,” he tried again. “You‟re tidier than most anyone I‟ve ever met.” “I should go,” Jed countered, pushing to his feet. “You know how to get to your people from here.” The words came easy, as if Jed were discussing the weather, but Gideon felt an ache tug at his innards. Not now, not yet, he wanted to say. Instead he said lightly, “Thought you promised to get me to my family. We ain‟t there yet.”

Jed frowned, but Gideon thought that the look in his eyes might be relief. He hoped it was, anyway, because he didn‟t want to be the only one of them feeling this lonesome. “I promised to get you to where they are staying. If we have missed them….” Gideon held his gaze, memorizing the deep blue of eyes on a dark face, and the way sunlight glinted in them so that they seemed to gleam. “The least I can do is give you one night in a good bed before you head back out. And one good meal,” he hurried on before Jed had the chance to argue about the merits of the bed. “Let me feed you before you get back on the trail.” Jed shook his head and sighed, but he didn‟t argue. The rest of the way to Oakland, they passed enough folks going in both directions that Jed didn‟t even chant. He fell back behind Gideon and pulled his hat low, keeping his eyes down as they rode along with the crowds. Gideon nodded and spoke, chatting when he found someone particularly talkative or interesting-looking, but he didn‟t match pace with anybody who rode in from behind them. Weren‟t no stranger he wanted to talk to enough that he was willing to share his last few hours with Jed with them. He found himself riding along beside a cart laden with fresh fall vegetables headed into town, squashes, onions and the first winter cabbages, or so he was told by Ham Braddock, the man driving it. “Bill Tourney‟s group?” Ham asked after they‟d exchanged their introductions, and he‟d chatted about the weather and the effect it was having on the growing season. “They‟ve been staying at the Shady View, haven‟t they?” “Yessir, they are,” Gideon nodded. “Think you‟re too late,” Ham said, shaking his head. “I go by there couple of times a week—been supplying them with onions and peppers for years now. Pretty sure I saw them packing out last week, and Norden, one of the kitchen boys, told me that they had a new group coming in this weekend, some doctors or dentists or something, though why a bunch of quacks think they need to get together and commend themselves for God‟s work is beyond me.”

“Well, I‟ve seen a broken bone or two set by a good sawbones in my time,” Gideon said, thinking about Doc MacCray and how he‟d saved Jed‟s life with poultices and medical knowledge brought all the way over from Europe. “I have, too,” Ham said. “Just ain‟t seen a need to crow about it.” Gideon snorted and nodded his thanks, a little disappointed that Jed wouldn‟t meet his folks now, but a little relieved, too. What, exactly, was he supposed to say? And how was he supposed to behave with a feller? He knew how he‟d introduce a woman, especially one he‟d traveled alone with across half the country—proudly, and lewdly when she wasn‟t looking, no matter how much he respected her. Gideon might have dismounted and strolled down the street, but he thought Jed might prefer staying a little above it all. The streets were pretty crowded, but the sky seemed bluer as the afternoon sunlight reflected off an ocean not so distant now. Urban homes and tall trees gave way to Oakland‟s business sector, stately buildings of limestone and brick, and thick bundles of cable crisscrossing the streets to feed the new lights of city life. Gideon led them through the mire of people and buildings to the inner harbor area south of the wharf—a little shabbier than the shiny streets of the proper city, but teeming with all kinds of people buying and selling all kinds of things. “Transcontinental ends just north of here,” Gideon said, pointing up Wood Street. “Ferries over to the San Francisco peninsula every fifteen minutes, and all through the night too.” “No one can be in that much of a hurry,” Jed said, rebuking white ways that Gideon had been kind of impressed by. “Some folks think they are,” he said with a shrug. It made no nevermind to him, and in truth he reckoned most folks took their own importance in the grand scheme of things too seriously. “But I tend to agree with you,” he said, lowering his voice enough that he could lean closer to say it. “Still, they know how to enjoy the pace of life at the Shady View,” he said. “I really do think you‟ll like it.” “I am beginning to think you are making it up, that there is no Shady View Hotel,” Jed said. The look he gave Gideon was gentler than the words, and Gideon smiled.

“It‟s not more than a couple of blocks away, now.” The Shady View was a big hotel, rambling even, with no true design. It had started out as a house years ago and over the time since, the owners had added to it easily as they could, buying up the few houses and what business would sell around it. Now, its main building was set back from the street, with a big trampled-down yard and a view of the foothills not far off. It and the buildings it had married itself to took up the corner of a block and then some, between the hotel and the stables. They dismounted in the front near a long hitch, but before they could tie off the horses, a freckled Irish kid Gideon had known for years trotted out the front to greet them. Jonah‟s uniform wasn‟t much of one, but he wore the blue chambray shirt and dark work pants that served as the uniform for the staff proudly. “Gideon!” he called, trotting down the stairs. He thrust out a hand, smiling like a long lost brother, and Gideon couldn‟t help but smile back. “Jonah!” he called back, shaking the offered hand. “Good to see you, kid! You haven‟t filled out yet?” he asked, teasing. Jonah was sixteen now, if Gideon remembered correctly, and growing up so fast his body was as thin as a rail. Jonah blushed, and the pink tinge hid his freckles a little better than his fair skin did. “Met a girl,” he said, trying to keep his voice low, but failing. “Belle Watkins—her daddy owns the feed store on the far edge of town. She‟s been trying to fatten me up too. Says the same thing all the time.” “She a good cook?” Gideon asked, trying to keep any sly innuendo out of his voice. Jonah‟s mother was a good Catholic—gave Jonah all kinds of trouble, to hear him tell it. “The best!” Jonah said, rubbing at his flat belly. “Ma says I‟ve got a tapeworm or something. I tell her it‟s just that I‟m still gettin‟ taller.” Gideon laughed and slapped the young man on his shoulder. “Well good for you, Jonah! I‟m sure your ma‟s happy—she was worried you were going to roam the world and end up in some far away place with exotic women.”

Jonah blushed even harder, and Gideon glanced over his shoulder at Jed, wanting to share his amusement. But Jed wasn‟t even looking at him. Jed stood beside his horse with his head down, fingers carding through the horse‟s too-long mane, and he had his hat pulled so low that Gideon could barely see his chin beneath its shadow. Gideon sobered, but held on to his smile, with an effort, for Jonah‟s sake. “You missed Bill and the group,” Jonah said, drawing Gideon‟s attention back. “They left earlier in the week—said they were loading out to Vacaville, then east to Sacramento.” “Vacaville?” Jonah nodded. “Bill was going on about the heat in the valley, so I guess he decided to save it for last.” “I‟ll be….” If the show was headed north and east, it would come back through the San Joaquin Valley and stop in Stockton on its way south and east to winter stomping grounds. He could have waited three weeks in Stockton for the show to catch up to him. “Gideon? I think your ma and pa left letters for you.” Jonah‟s smile faded to mild concern. “The manager said Bill did, too, but that he looked more put out than worried.” Gideon nodded and felt his smile come back. Letters from his folks would cheer him up, maybe—they usually did—and Bill was more bark than bite. “Lookin‟ forward to those,” he admitted, meaning it. “Jonah, I want you to meet a good friend—this is Jedediah Buffalo Bird,” he said, holding out his hand to wave Jed over. Jed looked up then, his face empty of any expression but his eyes were wary. He looked at Gideon then nodded to Jonah, but he didn‟t come any closer. Jonah smiled and made the step instead, holding out a hand. “Welcome to the Shady View, Mister Buffalo Bird. I can settle your horses for you in the stable—that‟s the better part of my job here, when I ain‟t hauling luggage. Or, if you want, I can just turn ‟em out in the corral for right now, and you can settle them when you get ready. Some folks prefer to take care of their own animals.”

When Jed blinked, his eyebrows drew together in what most might mistake as a frown. Gideon raised his own eyebrows. “I let him take care of Star, have for a couple of years now,” he said, and shrugged. Jed looked back at Jonah and nodded, taking Jonah‟s offered hand in a quick shake. “The corral will be fine,” he said. “Thank you.” He patted his pony on the neck, murmuring something to him that Gideon couldn‟t make out even though he could recognize Jed‟s own tongue after all this time, and after, he offered the reins to Jonah. Gideon gave Star‟s reins to Jonah without a second thought, but he did take the time to grab up his saddlebags and suitcase. “Jed, grab your pack if you want it.” He didn‟t look because he didn‟t know if Jed would do it, so he was relieved when he turned to see his friend hoisting the pack onto his back. At least Jed was staying the night. For his part, Jonah stood there holding two horses‟ reins with his mouth open wide enough to catch flies. “It‟s a good thing your daddy ain‟t here,” he said, shaking his head as he looked back at Star. “She looks like she could stand to eat and rest for a few days or more— Robert Makepeace ain‟t gonna like how rough she‟s looking, and you aren‟t taking care of her yourself? When was the last time you washed her down, Gideon?” He shook his head again, reaching out one hand to rub his fingers against Star‟s mane. “You leave her with me tomorrow, and I‟ll get her looking better—and your pony, too, Mister Buffalo Bird. He ain‟t shod? We need to get some shoes on him before he comes up lame. Horses‟ hooves aren‟t made for gravel and brick after all.” “No, they are not,” Jed said. “But he is fine as he is. If you wish to brush him down later, I will pay you for it.” Jonah shrugged, eying the gelding critically. “Yes, sir, I‟ll see what I can do.” He shook his head again as he led the horses off, talking to them as politely as he would a guest. “He‟s right about the shoes,” Gideon said as they headed up the wide stairs to the building‟s entrance. “Indian ponies do not need steel shoes,” Jed answered. “We walk on grass and dirt, not the hard roads of the white men.”

Gideon wanted to make a joke of it, but this close to their parting, he couldn‟t think up one easy word to say. Fortunately, as he came through the doors and into the hotel lobby, someone called his name, and he turned to see Jonah‟s mother, the hotel‟s clerk, pushing her way from behind the long wooden desk and heading straight for him. She was a big woman, but she carried herself with the polish of someone born to high society. Her dress was russet satin with cream lace trim at the neck, sleeves, and ruffle, and she wore enough underskirts to make it rustle and flow. She took Gideon in an embrace that was motherly but left him with no doubt about her cleavage or her corset, and he could swear he heard Jed snort out a laugh. “Your mother was so disappointed that you hadn‟t made it before she left!” she said as she pulled him back in for a second hug before finally letting him go. “That last hug is from her, son. I‟ve got letters from her and from your father—and Bill Tourney himself said to tell you to get your hind end on the next train. They‟re heading off to Vacaville and then parts south, and from there on to New Orleans— well, you know the route better than I do. And who do we have here?” She had turned her attention on Jed, her hands on her hips and her features pulled down into a frown. Gideon had known her all his life, so he knew it was just her way, but for the first time, it occurred to him that this was the look Jed probably got from most white folk—and one that would make him worry. “Why ever in the world are you running around with the likes of him?” she asked, and for a split second, Gideon opened his mouth to chastise her good and proper—until he realized that she was talking to Jed about being with Gideon, not the other way around. “Surely you could find better than this horse-boy to talk to on the road.” She grinned and extended one hand to Jed. “Welcome to the Shady View. I‟m Ruby, and I‟ve known Gideon since before he was walking. Known him long enough to know better than to expect good manners from him, so I‟ve learned to just ask myself—who are you, young man?” Jed reached up and took off his hat, reminding Gideon that he had yet to do the same. “Jedediah,” Jed said, wiping his hand on his pants

before taking hers carefully. “Jedediah Buffalo Bird. I am pleased to meet you.” “Well,” she said with a bigger smile, “I really am curious now. Polite and well-mannered—maybe you can teach Gideon a thing or two!” “I have tried,” Jed said, cutting his eyes to Gideon in a way that let Gideon know he was teasing. “But he is like a mule—very stubborn. Always trying to do things his own way, with no thought of the consequences.” The amusement in his tone dried away with the last words, but Ruby didn‟t seem to notice. She squeezed Jed‟s fingers before drawing her hand away. “That‟s our Gideon,” she agreed. “Very stubborn and very certain that he‟s always right—and no one knows better.” She turned away and headed back to the counter, waving them along behind her. The corners of Jed‟s lips twitched as he glanced at Gideon, but the sadness still showed in his eyes, as deep as Gideon‟s own. Gideon felt good for it, at first, knowing that Jed didn‟t want them to part. “You want one room or two?” she asked as she made her way behind the counter to her ledger. She went on before Gideon had a chance to answer. “I know you won‟t mind one. Carney folks and rodeo people, they‟re all the same. It‟s a small room, one bed, but it‟s pretty big—Gideon, I think you‟ve stayed in it before, the blue room at the top of the stairs on the third floor? Used to be an attic room so you have to be careful on the far side of the bed, but you two aren‟t too tall.” “We‟ll be fine,” Gideon said, remembering the room. It was small, but it would be fine for tonight. “Your timing is good, though,” she went on as she turned the register for Gideon to sign. “For dinner, we‟ve got pork roast and roasted chicken, with potatoes and squash and onions, and Maybelle‟s made chocolate cake and lemon cake for dessert.” She looked to Jed as she went on, “Don‟t let him make you late—we always run out of the lemon cake early, since it‟s one of Maybelle‟s specialties.” “We will not be late,” Jed said, nodding to her. “Thank you.”

“You want me to call Amos?” she asked as Gideon finished signing. “We can manage,” Gideon said. “And I know the way, thank you, Ruby.” She smiled as she handed the key across the counter along with two envelopes with Gideon‟s name on them. But she did get in one last taunt. “Your pa was worried that you‟d come dragging in with a woman on your arm and a wedding ring on your finger. I like your friend Jed, here, better.” Gideon smiled over his shoulder at her, but he looked to Jed as he said, “Yeah, me, too.” The room was one of the smallest in the hotel, but today, Gideon was happy about that. The bed was big enough that they ended up bumping up against each other as they moved around, and when the opportunity arose, Gideon took full advantage of it. He wasn‟t trying to start anything, even though he didn‟t move away when his groin brushed against Jed‟s backside. But he was more pleased with the casual touches they shared, his hands along Jed‟s back or shoulders, or Jed‟s hands on his arm. “I will care for the horses,” Jed said as he settled his pack in one corner. “Leave you to your letters.” Gideon glanced to where he‟d put them down on the dresser in the far corner. “They can wait—” “We came all this way for you to catch up with your family. Read what your parents have to say. I will be in the stable, then perhaps at the nearest bath house.” Jed eased out the door before Gideon had a chance to argue, and damned if now all he wanted to think about was Jed soaking naked in a hot bath. He sighed and peeled the wax seal off the first envelope. The letters were warm and worried, and he felt bad for being relieved that his family wasn‟t here. But neither of his parents seemed upset, and he realized that somewhere along the way, they‟d accepted his right and his responsibility for himself. He opened his mother‟s first.

My dearest Gideon, I hope you had such a wonderful time in Livingston that you decided to stay longer than expected, which is why you didn‟t make it in time to catch us. I‟m not worrying. I know you, and I know you let some sideshow distract you from your travels. So I‟m not worried. Remind me to teach you about telegrams—they‟ve been around for a while, but I suspect that you could have forgotten about them. We‟ve stayed to the train this fall, because we fell behind, playing extra days in places like Bisbee and Yuma, even San Diego had a warm welcome for us all! San Francisco—we‟ve been here three weeks, and every day I hoped to hear news from you. I expect to hear tales of adventures, when you do find us! Grace is already planning her wedding—not that there‟s been a set date or even an engagement announcement, but I promise you that the first thing you will hear when you find your way back to us is that you have to be in the wedding. She‟s planned it to the finest details, and if Jimmy lets her get away with riding astride up between a row of our band, well, he truly loves her! The twins have yet to understand that their „experiments‟, as they call them, will get them in trouble. Just yesterday, we found them playing doctor with Tommy Richmond—again! I thought seriously about sending them to a convent, but your father, when he finished laughing and had caught his breath well enough to speak, reminded me how much we‟d both miss them if I did. Twelve years old… I remember you causing me far less distress when you were twelve, my boy. But they say the mind plays tricks on a mother. The show is moving on—to Vacaville, then east to Sacramento and back down the San Joaquin Valley. We‟ll hit Stockton and maybe Merced, and I‟ll be back to trick shooting for a few stops. Bill isn‟t sure there are quite enough people for

us there, but we‟ll scout it out. Then it‟s the train back south and east: Albuquerque for sure, but I can‟t say where else yet on the drive into winter. Please hurry along, Gideon, before I lose my nerves, or your father loses his charm. And bring your lovely young bride—we need to start planning your future! Missing you, my child, Elizabeth His father‟s letter was much shorter, a bare bones of the status of the show, his horses, the health of the family, but like his mother, his closing was full of the affection Gideon never doubted: “Looking forward to your return, Gideon. Join us as soon as you can. Oh, and Bill is beginning to worry.” Bill‟s was barely a note on a postcard: “Will continue to dock your pay. Very soon, will start charging you for the trouble of keeping your slot open. —Bill.” Jed was still gone when he finished up, tucking the letters into a pocket in his suitcase. He dug out some clean clothes and his washing gear, then took the liberty of picking up Jed‟s whole pack. He had a thought about plundering to find what he knew Jed would want, but somehow, it was easier to take the whole thing, and he thought Jed would be more apt to thank him for that. The hotel lobby bustled with folks seeking drinks, news, or early dinner. They got the first two, but nobody got snacks before five o‟clock—which, Gideon noticed with a glance at the big grandfather clock in the corner, was over an hour away yet. Ruby waved to him as he passed the counter, but she didn‟t interrupt her talk with the group of finely dressed men standing in front of her. People had gathered on the porch, sipping drinks and talking in friendly groups. He nodded to the people he passed on the way to the stable, and he wasn‟t surprised to find it about as busy as the hotel itself. He was surprised—and pleased—to find Jed in the wide barn hall talking to Jonah while they each brushed out a horse.

“But don‟t they have trouble with their hooves?” Jonah was asking, looking across Star‟s back to Jed, who was facing him as he worked on his pony. “Not on grass and the earth,” Jed answered as he ran a brush down the pony‟s back. It was a sign that he was almost done, a fact that Gideon wasn‟t certain he was glad to know that he knew. He‟d gotten to know Jed far too well to want to leave him. “Their hooves are made for living on wild land.” Jed patted the pony on his withers, a gesture that was as affectionate as he‟d ever gotten with the horse, and stepped back. “Is there a bath house near?” he asked Jonah without acknowledging that he was aware of Gideon. Jonah glanced up and then over to where Gideon stood watching from the open barn doors. “Howdy!” he called, not so loud as to startle the horses, but loud enough. “Jed was just telling me about why his horse doesn‟t have shoes. I offered to have our blacksmith do it, but—” “Yeah, I know,” Gideon grinned, cutting him off and looking at Jed. “He‟s not going to be in town long enough.” Jed shrugged, turning toward Gideon. “Won‟t be any reason for me to,” he said. Gideon swallowed, hearing more in the words than he‟d ever expected. “The best bath house is two blocks over and down on the right— Mister Canney‟s place. You know it, don‟t you, Gideon? It‟s the same place we‟ve always sent the overflow.” “Yeah, I do,” Gideon agreed. It was a nice place and had treated everyone in the show—the whites and Indians and Mexicans and Chinese, men and women, too, as far as he knew—the same way. Oakland was a busy city, and they didn‟t talk much as Gideon led the way to the bathhouse. Inside, Mister Canney gave them a nod and took their money before directing them to two large tubs set side by side.

Gideon spent more time than he should have watching Jed out of the corner of his eye, his brown skin slick from water and steam, his black hair wet and shining. About the time Jed pushed up and out of the tub, Gideon scrubbed himself fast and thorough and followed him to the draped-off changing area. After, they made their way back to the hotel. Dinner was just getting underway by the time they‟d put their things back in the room, so they took a small table out on the wide back veranda. Their wide view from this corner of the porch let him see the hills to the east and the bay to the west if he craned his neck. Low evening sun cast long shadows and colored the foothills purple and gold and the air was cooling down—effects of the bay, he knew. It might get cold when the wind blew in off the ocean, but right now the air was pleasant and the food was good, some of the best Gideon had ever tasted. The service was better, their waiter, Franz, treating Jed as much as he did Gideon. Apparently, Franz thought Jed was about to be a showman, and Jed didn‟t dissuade him from the idea even though he kept frowning Gideon‟s way. “Not my fault,” he said with a shrug while Franz was off working other tables. “We travel with lots of Indians.” Jed put down his fork and leaned across the small table. “But you have never… traveled with an Indian before?” he asked. Gideon thought about playing dumb, just to see if Jed would squirm, but he didn‟t have the heart to. “Not a one, Jed,” he admitted. “Got good friends there, but that‟s all.” For all their efforts, talk was spare. Gideon couldn‟t shake his sense of sadness and his few attempts to talk sputtered and died like a matchstick in the rain. He mostly sat and looked out at the city lights because looking at Jed made him sadder. After Franz cleared their plates and brought them after-dinner brandy, Jed leaned forward, his arms on the table. His voice was so low that Gideon had to strain to hear it. “I could leave now, if it would be better.” “Ain‟t an issue of better, Jed. It‟ll be hard whenever it comes.” He leaned forward a little to add, “I‟d rather it come after I‟m rested and

ready for it.” He leaned back in his chair and watched the lights reflect off the wide waters of the bay. “I‟ll go to the bank tomorrow—I‟ve got cash aplenty waiting for me in San Francisco, and I‟d like to offer you something for all the time and trouble I‟ve put you to.” Jed froze like a pointing dog for a second, long enough that Gideon frowned at him. “What?” “You owe me nothing,” Jed said after a time. “I—no, not for—aww, hell, I just meant it took you longer to get me here than you expected, and—” “You owe me nothing, Gideon. You saved my life. Twice, if you are sure that rattlesnake was ready to bite. Stop trying to delay what must be. It is the end.” “I ain‟t trying to delay it,” Gideon said, annoyed because that was exactly what he was doing. “But I don‟t like saying goodbye, not to someone I care about.” He swallowed. “Not when I know I‟m never gonna see ‟em again.” “There is no Sioux word for „goodbye‟,” Jed said. He was using that word more and more, the name white folks called his people, and the words sounded gentler than they ought to. “They got a word for „you‟re leaving tomorrow, and I don‟t like it‟?” he grumbled. Jed sighed. “You do not know what tomorrow will bring.” He knew enough. “Where are you headed now?” he asked. He still wanted to offer Jed a job, but he didn‟t have the authority to do it, and knew he‟d likely be asking for trouble if he tried. “Back to Montana.” “Lonely trip, by yourself,” Gideon said. “Yes. Especially now,” Jed agreed. That was about the most honest admission Jed had made this whole trip, and Gideon appreciated it. He looked out at the boats that bobbed on rippling water down on the distant bay, at the way the lowering sun played across it and half-blinded him at the same time, and at the familiar buildings and wharves of the famous city beyond. He‟d never imagined that a place as crowded and sprawling as San

Francisco and its surrounding cities could make a man feel lonely, but he was just getting an inkling of how it was going to feel tomorrow. He half-envied Jed his trip back through the wild. At least in the wilderness and alone, if a man felt lonely it would make some damned sense. Here, surrounded by two hundred thousand people or more, Gideon had no excuse but the obvious one, and no one to tell. No way to tell and no will either, not even when he caught up with his family. What the hell could he say? That he‟d done maybe the dumbest thing he‟d ever done in his life? Maybe the best? And then he‟d walked away from it, and let Jed walk away from him, just because he knew that hard as that might be, trying to keep him would be harder—like, impossible? Even his mother wouldn‟t argue with his reasoning, not once she learned the truth. If she learned the truth. She‟d worry about him, because he reckoned he wouldn‟t be able to hide the sadness filling him for long, but she wouldn‟t pry too hard. She‟d believe him when he told her he just wasn‟t ready to say. And probably, she‟d send him to Ada Mae, and get her to try and fill up the hole opening up inside him with food. And still, Gideon wouldn‟t be ready to say. He looked over at Jed‟s quiet profile, memorizing the strong cheekbones, the fine, straight line of nose, the soft, thin lips and stubborn chin. This didn‟t even feel like his story to tell. They sat there in silence long after the sun set behind the San Francisco peninsula, and longer still. Jed closed his eyes after a time, and Gideon watched the bright oranges and yellows of the night sky fade to black, the gaslights of the city across the bay brighten all at once. Lights here in Oakland flickered up less evenly, countering the lanterns on a hundred or more boats bobbing out there in the bay, but rise they did, until he couldn‟t find more than a few stars in the night sky above. He blinked, though, trying, thinking that the sky right now seemed almost like the color of Jed‟s eyes. People wandered out onto the porch, some to dally there with cigars and pipes, others to stride out into the street seeking sport or more refined entertainment. The ferries would run back and forth all night, but Gideon didn‟t much care. He felt the time running out like

the last grains of sand falling through an hourglass, and soon enough he thought he might feel just as empty. “We‟d best go to bed,” he finally said, when most porch patrons had gone back inside or disappeared into the night. “I know you‟ll want an early start tomorrow.” Jed didn‟t say anything, didn‟t even look at him, just pushed fluidly up out of the wicker chair and strode silently to the door. He hesitated there, waiting, maybe, because he‟d gotten used to having a white man at his back. Maybe because he didn‟t see any more reason to part before they had to than Gideon did. So Gideon stood up, stretched briefly, and followed. The lobby had quieted, though there were still a dozen or more men and women at the bar. “Want a drink?” Gideon asked. Jed shook his head, and his black hair gleamed in the light off the chandeliers overhead. No. Jed wouldn‟t. Jed didn‟t like bars. Gideon would remember that, even if he didn‟t know why. Jed paused at the staircase so Gideon moved ahead of him, climbing steadily until he reached the third floor, listening for Jed‟s footfalls behind him but not hearing anything. He could feel Jed there, though, moving as quietly as he always did, letting the wool carpet on the hall floor absorb the sound of his passing. In the room, Gideon turned the knob to bring up the lamps—some chambermaid or other had already been in to light the pilots, and the faint whir of gas reached his ears before they caught. This place was as modern as they came, and Gideon smiled when Jed frowned at the fixtures, then stepped up to examine them curiously. Gideon didn‟t explain. Either Jed already knew, because Livingston had gaslights on its main streets, or Jed wouldn‟t care, because the ass end of nowhere, where Jed must surely choose to live, didn‟t have them. Either way, Gideon felt like he‟d run out of stories to tell. Gideon watched while Jed took off his boots and coat, setting them neatly aside, and slowly unbuttoned his shirt but left it hanging loose. Frowning, Gideon copied the movements and stood there awkwardly for a moment when he was equally undressed. Then he grunted his annoyance and shucked off his shirt and pants. His drawers

covered him decently enough that Jed better not complain. “It‟ll get warm in here,” he warned. Jed studied him a moment, and then he shrugged and slipped his shirt off. His bare, smooth chest seemed like it was taunting Gideon. Damn, he‟d messed himself up bad. “Privy at the end of the hall,” Gideon said. “They‟ve got some way of pumping bay water up and flushing the commodes out, so you won‟t have to find your way outside in the middle of the night.” Jed just nodded and stretched out stiffly on the edge of the bed, atop the covers. Gideon lowered the lights, leaving plenty to see the edges of furniture, the shadow of fluttering curtains—the outline of Jed‟s body. With a heartfelt sigh, he crawled carefully over Jed and stretched out beside him, propping on an elbow to look at him some more. Jed‟s eyelids fluttered closed while Gideon watched, and the man seemed as still as a corpse, until a sudden flutter of hands and hair brought him to his side. “Do not do this, Gideon,” he said softly. Gideon frowned. “Do what?” He imagined Jed was frowning back, but with the lights behind him now, couldn‟t tell for sure. “Do not mourn this. Don‟t belittle it by wishing it were different.” He felt the corners of his mouth twitch, trying and failing to turn up. “Too late.” Jed shoved at his shoulder, hard enough to land Gideon on his back for a second, and when he rose back up, Jed was still as a stone again. “You tellin‟ me you ain‟t gonna miss this?” Gideon challenged, keeping his voice barely above a whisper. “I am telling you I would rather miss it than the alternative.” Gideon felt a spark of hope flare in his chest. “What‟s the alternative?” The next words made that hope sputter and die: “That this never was.”

That was the only alternative. He wasn‟t so dumb as to think anything else, not with any man, but especially, given all he‟d learned in their time together, not with this one. And when he looked at it like that, it was easier to tuck his arm beneath his head and watch Jed‟s bare chest rise and fall, limned by the lamp across the room. It was easier to ignore the way his dick had gotten hard just from having Jed stretched out beside him in the dark. Jed might even let him try and start something, but Gideon didn‟t have the heart for it. He‟d had more fucking in the last six weeks than he‟d had in the past three years, all added up together. One more poke—or more likely, one more hand job—wasn‟t going to make this any better in the morning. So he just lay there, trying to identify the moment when Jed slipped off into sleep, storing up the smell of him, and eventually reaching a tentative finger to trace the soft skin of his belly, so he could store up that sensation, too. He lay there until the wee hours of the morning, awake and lonely already, and resisting mightily the idea of their parting. He must‟ve drifted off finally, because when he woke the lamps were out and morning light seeped through the window and around the edges of the brocade curtains. One brief, tired glance around the room told him that he‟d missed the moment altogether: the bedcover beside him was cold, and he was alone in the room.

Chapter 11

HE ROLLED onto his back and stared up at the ceiling, fighting a lump in his throat that made him feel like a dumb little farm boy. That was that, then. A chapter of his life—maybe the best chapter—was over. And now he had to take up his responsibilities and shoulder them like a man, let Jed go, take the ferry across to San Francisco and find his way to the bank Mister Landon had wired his money to, then decide if he was going to take the train north or travel east, back the way he‟d just come, to catch up with the show in Stockton or Sacramento. He‟d been so damned anxious to follow that money here, but now that he was at the end of the road, he kind of hoped that Wells Fargo had made a mistake somewhere, so he could ride back to Livingston to retrieve it. And if he happened to bump into Jed along the way…. Hell. Jed would hide in a bush and let him ride right on by. It hadn‟t taken him long at all to figure out that Jed was the smarter of them. He sat on the side of the bed for a while longer, feeling sorry for himself, until the need to piss overcame the need to wallow. When he rolled off the bed, though, and reached to retrieve his shirt, he cussed Jed a little. In the dim light he almost missed the token on top of his shirt: a hank of dark hair, long and straight and carefully smoothed, lay like an ink stain across the light-colored cotton. Gideon stared at it, then he picked it up carefully and spent a long few minutes trying to figure out exactly how he could carry it without losing it one strand at a time. In the end, he knotted it carefully and tucked it behind the flap in his wallet where extra cash was supposed to go. He rarely had that kind

of extra cash, and now he‟d just find another place to keep it. Stroking the coarse strand one last time, he folded his wallet, slid it into his coat pocket, and dragged on his clothes. Relieving himself quickly, he decided that maybe it wasn‟t so late after all, and that he was too damned stubborn to just let it happen like this. He took the stairs two and three at a time, and asked first at the front desk and then at the restaurant, to find out when his friend had been through. Genevieve, the hostess he‟d introduced Jed to last night, had his answer. “He was up a little before we opened the restaurant,” she said. “So I sent him to the kitchen to collect a plate, or a bag for the road. Nice fella,” she added, and smiled. “Yeah,” Gideon made himself say, “he is.” He dredged up a smile to trade for a cup of coffee, and took it outside then down the street to the corner. Jed must‟ve come this way. It was the way they‟d ridden in, after all, and as turned around as Gideon could get out in the wilderness, Jed seemed just as likely to get turned around in a city like Oakland. He squinted down the road, fancying that any second now he‟d see Jed‟s pony top a rise in the distance, swishing its tail. But he didn‟t, which could only mean Jed was already too far away to find. That didn‟t keep Gideon from standing there until his coffee cup was empty and the bright morning sun had burned a red spot into the backs of his eyeballs. He dredged up a smile again, just practicing to see if he could get it to stick on his face, and while it felt a little brittle, he reckoned it would pass, for most folks. The walk back to the hotel didn‟t take but a minute, even though he was in no hurry to get there. Still, he had work to do: he needed to check in on Star so the livery boss wouldn‟t tell tales to his daddy the next time they passed through. He needed to find out the ferry schedule and take a ride across the bay, track down his money and find some damned place to store it. He needed to check the hell out of this hotel and get his ass moving, before his folks started worrying about him—hell, he probably should have sent a wire from Carson City, just to let them know he was whole and well. He should still do that now, he thought, first thing after checking on Star.

“Morning!” Jonah called as Gideon made his way to the stable. “Star‟s out here, in the corral. Your friend got his pony—I tried to talk him into shoes again, but he was pretty much dead set against it.” Jonah lowered his voice a little. “I think he‟s wrong. That pony‟s already got a little split on a back hoof.” Gideon frowned. “It got hurt?” Jonah waved a hand. “Aw, heck no. Just—well, here,” he said, ducking his head and looking at the ground. After a few steps he paused and pointed. “Right there,” he said. “Not enough traffic to ruin the prints yet. You see that?” Gideon looked where he was told to, and spotted the prints in loose soil. Jonah was right. The imprints were distinctive and not just because the pony was unshod. “You could almost track a horse by that, couldn‟t you?” he asked idly. “Sure,” Jonah said easily. Gideon looked down at that news, worried his face might show more than it ought to. Jonah crouched down. “You‟d just look for that ridge. It ain‟t split, really, just chipped.” Gideon wasn‟t much of a tracker, and he knew it, but nobody loaded a horse that was unshod. Those deep, bare hoof prints would give him a clue, if he needed one. “Thanks, Jonah,” he said. “How‟s Star?” That got Jonah up and on to another line of chatter and also got Gideon‟s mind off Jed for a time. They walked her around the corral, and Gideon admitted to himself that his daddy wouldn‟t be proud of how he‟d let her training slide. So he put her through some of her easier tricks for Jonah. The young man had loved Star since she was a filly, and like many horsemen, he was fascinated with trick-horses and how to train them. The sun had climbed a bit by the time Jonah got called away to tack a pair of horses for some folk who were leaving. Gideon spent a few more minutes with Star, glad he was as fond of her as he was, because it helped him feel a little less lonesome. By the time he left the stable, he was almost looking forward to working with Star for a couple

of days, resting up from the trail, and seeing his folks and friends in the show. He was barely thinking on Jed at all. He supposed that was why the stab of loss went deeper when he opened the door to the room, and Jed was still gone. “Quit that, Gideon,” he chided himself. “What the hell did you expect?” His voice echoed back at him, and he shook his head, disgusted with himself. He cleaned up and dressed for the city, and decided to just put one foot in front of the other until it felt familiar again. He had plenty that needed doing, so he put his mind to the how of it all: the easiest way to get to the bank to get his money was to take the ferry, and if he hurried, he could make the next one. The sky was clear, the air cool from the winds over the chill water, but the sun warmed him well enough. He found a bench that was blocked from the wind and sat for the ride from Oakland to Alameda, where more passengers poured on and off, trying not to think about anything and not able to not think about Jed and how much he‟d have liked to have shared this ride with him. He wondered if Jed had ever been on a ferry, wondered if his pretty eyes would have widened in wonder or pleasure. Gideon wondered, too, about himself: whether he‟d ever have the chance to be with someone he wanted to be with as much as he wanted to be with Jed, or whether he had let the best thing that was ever gonna happen to him walk away. As the ferry chugged away from the Alameda pier, he got up and moved to stand against the rail, letting the cold salt air blow against him. The ferry boat rounded the tip of Alameda Island and turned right into the wind, making it seem twice as cold as it was. The only people willingly putting themselves out here in the wind and the occasional salt spray were a bunch of little kids, laughing and pointing at the chop in front of the ferry‟s square bow. Jed would have stood here, he reckoned, just to see where this boat was taking him, pretending he wasn‟t gawking at the size of the San Francisco Bay. In the thirty or more minutes it took to cross the bay and berth on a San Francisco pier, Gideon had gotten himself well and truly frozen.

He chafed his hands together to rub some warmth back into them and watched the passengers surge forward, offloading from the top two levels while a horse door was opened on the third. Gideon watched that for a few minutes, too, leaning over the rail with the sun warming his back, until he realized he was looking for an unshod dun that was already far from here. “This is ridiculous.” He didn‟t realize he‟d said it aloud until a man in a stovepipe hat looked at him strangely. Gideon smiled grimly and nodded his head and determined he was going to quit this right now. San Francisco had bright lights, noisy dance halls, theaters, and bars. It had gambling, and hot baths where a nice gal would scrub his back for him, and he was a fool to ruin his pleasure in it just because things had ended exactly how he‟d expected them to. Time to start appreciating it. The ferry had dropped him and a few hundred other folks at Pier 41, and he walked for a while along the Embarcadero, a region full of sounds and smells and people so different from what he‟d seen for the past two months that he lost himself for a while in the newness of it. He took a cable car to Chinatown to look at ducks hanging in shop windows, pork legs roasted dark red and sweet, and people from ten countries or more hawking wares, buying and selling food and goods, before he made his way back on foot to the financial district. Sometimes someone would smile at him, and he‟d nod and say hello, but he spent most of his time looking up at the buildings and around at the shops, and at all the women walking in the crowd, some fancy and some not so fancy, seeing things he had no idea what they were, seeing people more exotic than Jed or any of the people they‟d met along the way. He didn‟t stare—he was a showman himself, and he knew better—but it was fun, and he felt like a part of him was back. He felt more like himself than he had all day, until he rounded the corner where the bank was and almost tripped over a long-haired, buckskin-clad brave standing in the sidewalk. For a split second—or for an hour, he never got a sense of the time—he thought it was Jed. The man moved, stepping forward toward another buckskin-clad fella, and Gideon saw them both clearly for the first time. Not Jed, not

even Sioux. He wasn‟t sure what tribe, but neither man wore eagle feathers, their faces were very different, and there was just something about them that didn‟t feel like Jed to him. That realization, that he knew Jed that well, burned hard in his belly and reminded him of all the things he‟d been so busy not thinking about. He walked fast to the bank and found a line, waiting for his turn with the man behind the counter. The bank was ornate and just breathed wealth—big wooden counters with brass nameplates, marble floor and dark wood counters polished to a high shine. He looked around, impressed despite himself. Everything looked shiny and bright and clean, no smudges on anything, no dust in the air, no grit on the floor. And big—high ceilings, wide columns to support them—a man could get lost in here with no way to track him. Not even Jed, as good as he was, could track someone in this fine place. He was thinking about tracking when his turn came, and he stepped up to the window. All of his money was there, even though it did take them a little while to validate the letter he had from Landon. He didn‟t take out all his money, though, only $120. He still had six or seven dollars left from the trail, and didn‟t hardly need the hundred, but it felt good to have it in his pocket. He worked out how much they‟d charge him to wire the rest to New Orleans, where he could deposit it in his own bank when the show set down stakes for wintering, took another forty dollars just in case, and paid the dollar to wire the balance on. He left the bank, blinking in the bright afternoon sun, and got oriented toward the bay. Any other time, he might have strolled up past Fisherman‟s Wharf to Fort Mason, maybe even past the Presidio to the Golden Gate, where barely half a mile of strait let the waters of the Pacific surge in, and ferries battled the currents back and forth to the Marin headlands. When he had the time he almost always went out to the headlands, just to stare out at the rocky coast and watch the tall ships navigate the treacherous waters. Wild nature held no appeal for him at the moment. He‟d traveled with it for months, talked to it and learned it and bedded it, all embodied in one man, and standing on an empty shoreline wouldn‟t bring that feeling back.

He marched straight back to the ferry and took a seat inside on the lower level for the choppy ride back to Oakland. Once they‟d landed he turned for the train station. The Transcontinental ended just a few blocks north of the hotel, and the sprawling station could supply him with a ticket to any place in the country. Sure as hell, it could get him and Star to Vacaville or Sacramento right quick, and in more comfort than he‟d had for two months or more. But standing in line, what he thought about most was that this was where the train from Livingston would have dumped him, weeks faster than it had taken him to walk the distance. All he thought about was that much as he loved his ma and daddy, each of them had left their homes when the right reason had come along. “Destination?” He blinked at the man behind the counter, whose round spectacles reflected light under his flat black visor. “How much for a ticket to…?” He blinked again, thinking hard and fast. He might never find Jed again, even if he lit out for him right now. “To where, son? You‟re holding up a busy line, here.” The man tapped the counter with the fingers of one hand, the beat of them like time itself, pushing at Gideon. “Sorry. Thanks. I‟ll—come back later,” he said, even though he wouldn‟t. He was in a hurry now, ready to gallop out on the path he‟d barely plodded in on. Jed hadn‟t been gone eight hours, and he was traveling with a horse that would slow him down. He couldn‟t have gotten far. Gideon felt like a scrounger for skulking around the hotel‟s barn, but there was no way he was going to listen to a sixteen-year-old kid chastise him for taking his horse back out. He had to wait a good quarter-hour, or at least it felt like that, for Jonah to scoot off to the hotel‟s entry and help some folks in with their bags, but as soon as the kid was out of sight he jogged into the barn, saddled up Star, nodded a brief howdy to the darkie who did most of the heavy lifting inside here, and told him to tell Jonah he‟d be back tomorrow, and to make sure Star would have a stall and grain. He left his saddlebags and suitcase in his room and filled his canteen at the pump—he‟d be back soon either

way, and he wasn‟t going to put a pound onto his horse that he didn‟t need. He didn‟t need her hauling much today, he just needed her lively speed that Jed so liked to criticize. “We‟ll see about that, Jed,” he muttered under his breath, and kneed Star into a trot because it was already past noon. The tidal flats ticked by fast, mostly because Star‟d had a good night‟s rest and pampering, and because she could feel the nervous energy in him. She stepped lively, and Gideon had to work not to nudge her faster still. When he saw the signs of Walnut Creek less than three hours after he‟d left the hotel, he eased Star into a walk and offered her a pat to her damp shoulder. A couple of kids played jackbones near a public water pump, playing hooky from school, and they were the first people to admit they‟d seen an Indian ride through earlier. “You missed him by a mile, mister,” the girl said. She had at least one front tooth missing, and he couldn‟t figure out why he liked her so much until she tipped her head back and the sun struck her dark blue eyes. They weren‟t as dark as Jed‟s, but they were close. “How much of a mile?” he asked, digging into his pocket and pulling out a penny. “You‟re at least two or three hours behind him, I‟d say,” she offered. Gideon tossed her the penny, and she snatched it out of the air as easily as she‟d been scooping up jacks. “You share that with your friend there,” he told her. “He‟s not my friend,” she said, wrinkling her nose and tossing her head, “he‟s my brother.” Gideon laughed at the disdain she had for the pronouncement. “I‟ve felt that way about my own brother a time or two,” he admitted. And about his sisters, even more. “Now, which way‟d he go?” After he‟d let Star drink her fill at a public trough, bought her a bag of oats, and rubbed under her saddle blanket with a piece of burlap, Gideon mounted back up and left town at a trot. That whole stop couldn‟t have taken him ten minutes, and they made good time to the next wide spot in the road.

Clayton was no more than that. He and Jed hadn‟t even paused in this place. But Gideon did, to get some grub he could eat in the saddle and stretch his legs. He ought to be ashamed of just how much his back ached from a few hours at a trot, but as long as he found Jed before the Sierra Nevada started rising too tall in front of him, he didn‟t care. There was no way he‟d find Jed if he let him get past Stockton. Too many different routes left that town, and maybe Jed wouldn‟t want to ride back through Jackson, after he‟d traded off the horse Mrs. Hennessey had given him. Maybe he wouldn‟t even go directly home, once he‟d stopped in a city alone. Gideon walked stiffly out the other side of town, leading Star along and staring hard at the road for the mark of an unshod pony. He didn‟t find it in the dry rutted parts, nor in the smooth center. He worried he wouldn‟t find it at all until he remembered Jed‟s habit of walking on the roadside, where the earth was softer, the gravel more sparse. There. And just to the left of the horse‟s hoofmark was the indentation of a boot he recognized. When had he learned to recognize Jed‟s walk? Probably all that time he‟d spent staring at Jed‟s ass, he thought with a sigh. Jed could chase him right back to town, and probably would. But Gideon would rather be chased away than let this chance go without a fight. The sun had lowered so far that Star trotted into her long shadow before Gideon decided he‟d best slow her down, maybe start looking for a camp for the night. He couldn‟t stomach the idea though, because Jed was an early riser and would put more hours, more miles between them before the sun was decently up. So he slid off his horse, scratched her neck in mute apology, and felt his mouth moving before he properly heard the sounds. It was Star‟s ears swiveling his way that let him know he was chanting. Jed‟s chants, words he didn‟t even know. Fear that he was praying to a false god stopped the sounds for a minute, but no longer. Jed had prayed to these nature gods his whole life, and if they were good enough for Jedediah, they were good enough for him. Even if Gideon didn‟t know what the hell he was asking them.

The sun set, and Star‟s head was hanging low, and still he pushed on, watching the road carefully and letting Star pick her way through the shadows. The moon had been up for a time, full and round, but its light was no match for the setting sun or the dusk that settled over the land. “Not long before that full moon gives us all the light we need,” he promised her. “Once the sun‟s gone, it‟ll be bright enough to read a newspaper by.” It wouldn‟t, but it‟d be plenty bright to keep moving. It was, and bright enough to see the markings in the road—and the ones that weren‟t there. He wasn‟t sure how far he went along before he realized he wasn‟t seeing the prints of either unshod hooves or Jed‟s boots. Star snorted her annoyance when he stopped and dismounted, kneeling down with a tired groan. Rising to a stand and staring off toward the dark shadows of the horizon, relying only on the full moon that arced toward its zenith, he had to admit that the damned moon he‟d promised his darned horse wasn‟t doing as good a job as he needed it to. But he thought Jed might be behind him now. He found a certain dark humor to the idea of lying in wait for him, then jumping out of a bush when Jed passed him on the road. That humor was far outweighed by the idea that if he tried, Jed would likely shoot him before he recognized him for who he was. That, or be so mad he‟d ride his horse to death to get away from him. Some things, Gideon had learned long ago, you just didn‟t do to an Indian you respected. On the other hand, there were many, many things he wanted to do to Jed that he was right positive Jed would allow. “Must be a creek around here somewhere,” he told his horse, talking now just to break the night-time quiet as he peered into the darker shadows along the roadside. He couldn‟t hear water burbling, and now that he was standing still he had to wonder if there weren‟t wild animals he ought to be afraid of, roaming this area at night. Probably not. Probably, there were too many people, too many homes and plowed fields to welcome more than skunks and raccoons, a smart fox, or coyote. “There‟s nothin‟ here,” he assured himself, and scritched Star‟s ears to make sure she wasn‟t listening too hard for danger.

How the hell did Jed prefer this, being alone in the dark with nothing and no one around him to keep him warm at night and watch his back when the wild got too close? Gideon smiled and shook his head at his fancy. Jed was as at home in the wild—and as much a part of it—as Gideon was at home in a show ring. There wasn‟t nothing for him to fear here. Still, if he‟d been traveling with a friend maybe those wild pigs would never have caught him unawares. That rattler sure had been better faced by the pair of them, than by Jed alone. Gideon was glad for the sharp shadows the moon cast over the land, painting it in silver. It was enough, barely, for him to get a good look at the road and confirm that Jed and his pony hadn‟t passed this way yet. They‟d left the road somewhere behind him. Gideon was sure of it. “Come on, girl,” he whispered, clicking his tongue against his teeth even as he pulled her head around. “Don‟t seem fair, making you go back and forth all day, does it?” But once they‟d turned around, it didn‟t take long at all to recognize where he was, even in the dark: this was the last place they‟d camped. On the left side of the road, he could see the little path they‟d turned off on, hardly a trail at all. He‟d missed it the first time because he wasn‟t looking for it, because he hadn‟t considered that Jed would go back to somewhere they‟d been together, and because, truth be told, he hadn‟t recognized it coming from the other direction. But as he stood at the place where the grass was rough and looked a little torn down, he remembered how he‟d watched Jed sleep, and how he‟d wanted to touch and resisted. “Jed!” he called quietly, more a whispered hiss. Hell, there could be robbers or drunks bedded down in that pretty spot he and Jed had shared. Wild things sure as hell weren‟t the only dangers when you neared cities the size of Oakland. “Don‟t go shootin‟ me, now!” He saw the pony first, tied off in the same place he‟d tied off both the horses three nights past. Its dunskin coat reflected moonlight like shadows on a pond. Star nickered and the pony whuffed an answer, and

Gideon was so relieved he‟d found Jed that he didn‟t notice when the man snuck up on him. “Gideon.” The word was as loud as someone shouting from a street corner, because Jed stood not a foot behind him. Gideon jumped hard and fast enough that Star danced back on her hind legs. “Shit! Shit, Jed!” He fumbled his hand at his hip, where instinct had had him reaching for his gun. “You looking to get shot?” Jed shook his head, but his teeth flashed white in the moonlight. “Were you not just worried that I was going to shoot you?” Gideon glared at him, swallowing his heart back down into his chest where it belonged. “You know, not five minutes ago I was thinking about you, about the fact that some things, a man just doesn‟t do to a man he respects!” “Yes?” “Yes!” Gideon sniped. “He don‟t sneak up on him and scare the bejesus out of him, is one of them!” Jed frowned and nodded. “Yes….” “Well, then, why the hell…?” “You said a man doesn‟t do that to a person he respects,” Jed said. Gideon could hear the smile in Jed‟s voice even if he couldn‟t see it on his face. “Oh, har har,” Gideon said, resisting the urge to rub at his chest. Here he‟d thought he was all settled down standing in the dark by himself, and the man he‟d come running after had just scared ten years off him. “Help me with my damned horse.” Jed eased up beside him and pulled off Star‟s saddle and blanket, hefting them over to the pile of his own things. When he came back and put a hand to her side, Jed blew out a low breath and pulled off his shirt, using it to rub her down. The shirt would come away wet and smelling of horse by the time he got done. “You have ridden her long and hard,” Jed admonished. Gideon wanted to feel ashamed for that, but he‟d worked her in a good cause, and she was young and fit and lighter than she‟d been two

months back. He knew she‟d be all right, or he wouldn‟t have pushed her. “Yeah, well, you could‟ve left slower, and I wouldn‟t have had to.” “I—” The sound of Jed‟s teeth clicking together sounded loud in the dark, and Gideon could count the number of times Jed had almost let something slip like that on one hand. The anger left Gideon as fast as Jed had scared it into him. “What?” If anything, Jed‟s thin lips pressed into a flatter, tighter line, and Gideon knew what he‟d get for his troubles if he pushed now: nothing. So he pulled off Star‟s bridle and scratched her cheek, and took Jed‟s shirt when Jed finished one side, working down her other, feeling her legs for warm spots and checking her over as best he could in the dark. “You‟ll be all right, girl. You done good today,” he told her. Once he had her settled, he turned to find Jed just standing there facing him in the little clearing, his body silhouetted by the moon and the expression on his face completely hidden. “What?” Jed didn‟t say anything, didn‟t even move. “What, Jed? What were you gonna say, before?” He closed the space between them carefully, since finding the man was the easier part in all of this. Now that he‟d found him, he could run him off if he said or did the wrong thing. Hell, he‟d probably run him off anyway, but at least he‟d have tried to keep him. When he stopped a couple of feet away, Jed said, soft as a whisper, “I left as slowly as I could.” It didn‟t even take a thought to get his hands into Jed‟s hair, holding his head tenderly and wishing for more light than the full moon had to offer. “I love you, Jed,” he said, pouring all the earnestness that had grown in him and all the loss he‟d felt on the days leading up to Jed leaving, and all the fear he‟d felt on the road today that he might not find Jed again. “I walked around San Francisco, saw all sorts of things I‟d like to show you, beautiful things, crazy things. Even saw Indians that nobody was bothering. And they didn‟t do nothing for me, without you there to share ‟em with.”

“Gideon,” Jed said, and he sounded so sad, Gideon didn‟t want to hear anything he might think needed saying with that tone of voice. “Don‟t, all right? We‟ll talk all you want tomorrow.” “And tonight?” “Whatever you want, Jed. Or whatever you don‟t.” It turned out that Jed wanted a lot more than Gideon had expected him to. They were still plenty close to the Pacific and the inland bays that the nights were chilly no matter how warm the days got. So it made sense that when Jed moved to strip away Gideon‟s clothes, Gideon would be cold. But he wasn‟t. They made love—and it was love, Gideon knew that in the way Jed touched him, urged him with gentle and demanding caresses, encouraged him with low sounds that Gideon knew he‟d been holding back all this time. Jed led, and Gideon let him, but they both wanted the same thing—the pleasure of each other‟s bodies and the joy of being together. Jed lay back, drawing Gideon down onto him, into him, with a sweetness that hadn‟t been there, their first time together or even their last. He still wanted Jed as much, but it was more than that. The last couple of times, they‟d been feeling like goodbyes to him—whether the Sioux had a word for it or not, they sure did know how to say it. Tonight it felt more like relief, even if they were only postponing their goodbyes for a time. There was no rush, no hurry to the end, but they didn‟t try to hold off and store every little bit of it for lonely times, neither. Jed held him close, closer than he had before—at least, closer than he had before he got so close to coming he couldn‟t control the clutch of his hands or his legs or any other part of him. It slowed their movements but made Gideon more aware of the body beneath him, of the man himself. He was so glad to be with Jed, to have him here and now, to be able to think and feel how much he loved him, that he didn‟t have to work to control himself or to pace himself to satisfy Jed‟s needs. He even tucked his face into the fast-beating pulse at Jed‟s throat and said it, said “love you,” over and over again like it meant more than just the words themselves. He said it like Jed said his prayers, as his hips rolled

of their own accord, and his cock slid into the place he thought of as his now, rubbing up against parts of Jed that made Jed‟s supple body writhe and rock like a boat on big waves. With the next thrust, he slid his cock deep and held there, pressed flush up against the firm muscles of Jed‟s ass, and said it again: “Love you,” barely able to tolerate the fact that he‟d been too much a coward to say it before now. He wasn‟t quite there when Jed found his release, but the kiss Jed gave him, wet and tender and sighing breath into his mouth, and the keening sound Jed made that sounded like great pain, but wasn‟t, did as much to undo him as the ripples of Jed‟s flesh around his cock. They held on to each other through it, gasping into each other‟s mouths as pleasure shook them both, and when the climax ebbed away, maybe Gideon held on even tighter. “Let me breathe,” Jed gasped after a time, and Gideon dragged his arm from where he‟d wormed it around the small of Jed‟s back and carefully pulled away, freeing his cock from Jed‟s body and moving just far enough to lie only half-atop him, instead of all the way. “That better be enough,” he said, trying to grumble. “I‟m damned tired from all that riding today.” “Then you need far more exercise,” Jed said lazily. Gideon felt his lips twitching, and was glad of the darkness. “Just think how cold you‟d have been out here without me to keep you warm,” he mumbled into the smooth, sweet skin of Jed‟s bare shoulder. “Speaking of which… you need your other shirt.” “I do,” Jed mumbled, and yawned. Gideon frowned and tried to rouse himself. “I‟ll fetch it,” he offered, but he didn‟t move and Jed didn‟t try to make him. Instead they stretched to grab what was near them—Gideon‟s undershirt that Jed had peeled off with the rest of Gideon‟s clothes, the trousers they‟d stepped out of that lay piled right by Jed‟s blankets. It took a little longer to work most of them on, but Jed wasn‟t stupid and no matter what Jed liked to imply, neither was Gideon. He fell asleep sharing Jed‟s blankets because his bedroll was still in his hotel room, a good day‟s ride away.

WHEN Gideon woke the next morning the sun hadn‟t made it over the hilltops to the east, but it scattered plenty of light to see by. Jed was already up and gone, and with sleep clouding his mind, he wondered if he was alone again and would have another hard day of hunting ahead of him. But as he woke enough to register the chill in his toes he recognized Jed‟s blankets, smelling the man himself in them. He heard the horses in the distance, both of them, and he smiled, wondering what Jed was going to complain about whenever he got back from wherever he‟d gone. He forced himself up, gritting his teeth at the cold bite of early morning air, did his business, and he was back stirring up a fire when Jed eased into the camp, carrying a string of fish. “Good,” he said, his voice grim, “we can eat and be on our way.” There was something sharp in his tone, and Gideon looked down to where the dry, smaller twigs were taking the flame to hide his face and the smile he felt stretching it. Jed was pissy—that was a good sign. “Yep,” he agreed, “we can. We can head back to the hotel, grab up my stuff—” “You mean you and Star,” Jed cut him off, his tone harder. Fighting the bit, Gideon thought. But he‟d gentled animals all his life— domesticated creatures, sure, but his talent had to work on a wild thing like Jed. It had to. He drew a breath then stood and turned to face Jed, meeting his gaze. “No, I mean you and me. Star and your pony, too, but you and me, Jed.” He reached out, pleased when Jed didn‟t pull away but stepped forward into his arms. “I came to find you, and it wasn‟t just for another night between the blankets—no matter how good those are.” He stepped closer, sliding his hand up Jed‟s arm to cup his cheek. “I don‟t aim to let you walk away from me.” Jed did back away then, drawing free of Gideon‟s hold. “Gideon,” he said, but the word was slow, and so sad that Gideon hurt for him. “We cannot—”

“Why?” he asked, cutting off the words he didn‟t want to hear. “Why can‟t we, Jed? There are lots of places we can go and be together—hell, we could work in the show, live like my ma and pa do. They ain‟t married but I‟ve got three sisters and a brother as decent as me, and nobody thinks nothing of it. I know—” he held up one hand, rushing on as Jed started to cut him off, “that it‟s different from what you and me got, I know that. But show folk, they don‟t care as much as most other folk. We got Indians in the show, Jed, you‟ll have others like you—not Sioux, but Injuns, at least.” When he had to stop to catch his breath, Jed jumped in. “Indians not of my people. And your parents, your siblings… how will they feel when you show up with me—a man and a Lakota?” He shook his head, his face tightening into hard lines. “My people do not think as much of two-spirit people, but they would fear my love for a white man. Your kind is not known for—” “You love me?” Gideon interrupted, latching on to the words that mattered. “Do you love me, Jed?” Jed flinched like somebody had raised a hand to strike him, and shook his head hard enough to make his hair fly around his shoulders. When he crossed his arms over his chest, he looked… he looked exactly like Gideon‟s mother did sometimes, when she got caught out by something she‟d said herself. “It does not matter.” “It‟s the only thing that matters!” Jed frowned, tilting his head to the side and staring at Gideon like he was watching some foreign animal he‟d never seen before. “Being alive matters more. Being free….” He sighed and turned his face toward the rising sun. “Being free matters more.” “Being alive for what, Jed?” The very idea that Jed could walk away from what they felt for each other, that he would choose to live his life alone, with nothing good to hold on to, made Gideon ache for his lover—and brought back some of the fear he thought he‟d put behind them. “If not for feelings like these, what the hell good is being alive for?”

Jed swung his head around to glare over his shoulder at him. “There are other feelings besides these,” he said, slow and hard. “There are feelings no man should have to feel.” Gideon understood that. He truly did. For all the good fortune he‟d had in his life, he‟d still had plenty of folks look down on him— more if they learned his folks weren‟t married, more still if they learned how his mother earned her pay—and his ma had certainly suffered more judgment and scorn than she had ever begun to deserve. “You think you can avoid feelin‟ those feelings, just because you turn away from the better, higher ones?” “I….” Jed‟s mouth worked for a second, and he blinked slowly, and Gideon felt like he‟d just won the toughest, fastest horse race in the world. “See?” he said, pushing his point home. “I may be younger than you, but I‟m twenty years old, Jed. I‟m no kid, and I ain‟t so dumb as you want to think. I ain‟t gonna be the man to make you feel them bad feelings. And I‟m not a man who‟ll walk away and let us both live to old age full of regrets.” Jed sighed and dropped to a squat, pulling out his knife to gut the fish, and Gideon let him. He had his horse to tend to, checking her hooves now that he had daylight to see them, and setting her nearer a patch of tall grass. After a second he did the same for Jed‟s pony, then he came back to the fire and laid a couple of heavier sticks on, now that the tinder was burning hot. Once Jed had stuck sticks through the fishes‟ gills and propped them over the fire to cook, he started pacing, a behavior Gideon hadn‟t seen in him this whole trip. Gideon opened his mouth more than once and then shut it, remembering more of his mother‟s words: sometimes, honey, if you try and talk a man into something, you‟ll end up talking him out of it. But if you let him work his way around to it himself, he‟s more likely to stick to his decision. Of course, his ma had been talking about how to deal with his daddy and his brother, but Gideon had learned over the years that it was true of just about anybody. Seemed the older he got, the smarter his mama got.

Jed stopped his pacing to tend to the fish while Gideon just watched the smoke swirl lazily eastward. The land was heating already, and sucking in more cool breeze off the bays. It just about killed Gideon to keep quiet, because the act was less natural to him than Jed‟s pacing was to Jed. Or maybe than happiness was to Jed. Jed had a lot of peace in him, but at least early on, he hadn‟t seemed to carry much joy. Hard as the silence was for Gideon, it paid off by the time Jed pulled the little trout off the fire and planted the sticks in the ground with a huff. “All of the reasons this is bad still exist.” Gideon nodded. “I can‟t argue that. But Jed, you rode slow—hell, you had to have dragged your feet to take this long to get here. And I rode hard. And I always will, so you‟re gonna have to work to shake me.” Jed dropped to a squat, hands hanging loosely between his knees, and glared. “So this is to be a war, then? I‟ve seen too much war, and I want no part of it.” Gideon shook his head. “Last thing in the world I want is to fight you. I‟d let you go, if you convinced me that fighting was all we‟d be doing.” He stared at Jed, holding his breath as the other man opened his mouth as if he‟d actually say it, as if he‟d try. But after a time that seemed like forever, Jed merely sighed. “I still foresee a lot of fighting in our future,” he warned. Gideon wanted to take that news soberly. But all he had ears for was “our future.” He tried to pick the right words out of the million things he wanted to say. What came out wasn‟t quite what he‟d expected, but his mouth had its own ideas. “Long as we‟ve got a future, Jed, I‟m all right with that.” He let the grin settle on his face, feeling his skin draw tight, he was so happy. “You wait ‟til you see New Orleans. Nobody there‟s going to think anything of you or of us.” “I don‟t care for cities,” Jed tried, a lame excuse at best, because as far as Gideon was concerned things were already decided.

“You‟ve never seen real cities,” he countered. “Nah,” he said, waving a hand, “don‟t waste our fightin‟ time on that. I know you‟ve skirted plenty of towns, and I remember you lived in Laramie, but the really big cities? All kinds of men can get lost in those, and don‟t nobody care a whit about them. That‟s the way it will be for us—you just wait.” Jed sighed. “Gideon… why did you come here? Truly, think about your words before you answer, and tell me why you came.” He didn‟t have to think. He knew. He‟d thought about it ever since he‟d walked out of that train station like a crazy man. He‟d thought about it while he sat to Star‟s trot for hours on end, worrying about her legs and his ass, her hooves and his heart. He knew. But he waited the space of a few breaths, counting seconds in his head to try and show some respect before saying, “‟Cause this is where you are, Jed. And I‟ve decided that that‟s where I want to be—wherever you are.” The smile that touched Jed‟s mouth and the affection in his eyes warmed Gideon—even the tug on fine black eyebrows and the clear effort Jed made to hide that smile and that affection. “You know so little,” Jed breathed. Gideon took the two steps he needed to get to where Jed knelt, and dropped to his ass on the ground beside him. He tugged a fishloaded stick out of the ground and handed it Jed‟s way, then grabbed another for himself, using his fingers to peel the skin back and expose the white, tender meat. Watching Jed‟s eyes dart nervously from the fire to their hands to the fish—and every so often, up to his mouth, following the fish past his lips, Gideon chuckled softly and shook his head. Scooting over a little so that his boot almost touched Jed‟s butt, he picked another flake of meat off the bones and held it out, waiting. Jed‟s frown was fierce this time, but after a second he bent his head, tilting it sideways to keep his hair back, and took the meat off Gideon‟s fingers. Gideon felt his cheeks start to ache, he was smiling so broadly. “Lucky for you I like learnin‟, then.”

THEY reached Walnut Creek near noontime, ambling along shoulder to shoulder and leading their horses behind them. Gideon pulled up by the telegraph office and wrapped Star‟s reins around a hitching post. “Hold up. Need to send a message to my family.” Jed reached and grabbed his forearm in a firm grip. “To say what?” he asked, as wary now as he‟d been in their first days of traveling together. Gideon grinned. After offering up a frown that Gideon was sure would work permanent lines into his face, Jed dropped his arm and tied off his horse. “Go on, then.” “Come with me, then,” Gideon teased, and he smiled wider when Jed narrowed his eyes, but he fell in beside him.

Elizabeth Crowley, STOP c/o Bill Tourney, Grand Hotel, Sacramento. STOP Have met new friend and am seeing a whole new country. STOP See you in N. Orleans. STOP Am learning about telegrams. STOP LOVE.

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About the Author

MARGARET MILLS is a professional technical writer and editor; branching into narrative fiction seemed like a natural extension of the pleasure that writing has always been for her. A California resident, Maggie enjoys hiking in the nearby hills, reading, walking the dog on the beach, and writing with her co-author, Tedy Ward. Maggie met Tedy in a writers‟ group, and their personalities mix almost as well as their characters‟ do; they enjoy writing the kinds of stories they love to read. Her most exciting adventure involved a brief but thrilling skydiving habit. Her next exciting adventure involves a trip to Yosemite National Park where she‟ll be hiking Half Dome with her husband of twenty-five years. Visit her web site at http://sites.google.com/site/wordprocesses/home.

TEDY WARD has been a technical writer in the legal and academic fields for many years. She lives in Georgia and enjoys reading, walking her dog, and writing with her co-author, Margaret Mills. Tedy met Maggie in a writers‟ group, and their personalities mix almost as well as their characters‟ do; they enjoy writing the kinds of stories they love to read. When time permits, Tedy enjoys hiking, cooking, and reading, using her commute to and from work to listen to audio books or the news if she‟s feeling particularly mellow about the state of the world. Visit her web site at http://sites.google.com/site/wordprocesses/home.

Western Romance from DREAMSPINNER PRESS

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