No One Can Hide

CHAPTER ONE Catherine “Cathy” Courtauld lived on the far side of the river in a small log cabin her husband Jude built before he died of scarlet fever in the summer of 1870. Some people from the nearby town of Bethlehem believed he had picked up something awful from one of the many bordellos he was known to frequent, but Cathy did her best not to listen to such spurious, hurtful gossip. People were jealous of what she and her husband had achieved in such a short span of time, and when folk are jealous, they allow their tongues to wag. That was how she saw it, and nothing much had happened since to convince her otherwise. Jude was a good man, and she missed him. Well, “good” in the sense that he provided. She wasn’t so certain about everything else. A slim, strikingly handsome woman, she worked tirelessly to keep the family smallholding in good condition, something in which she excelled. Nevertheless, loneliness gnawed into her bones. The land was uncompromising, the soil hard, the weather lacking in rain. She longed for a partner to share her burdens. The late afternoon she heard the spattering of gunfire, she was on her knees, weeding through the root crop. She stopped, senses alerted. Cautiously, she raised her head and squinted towards the distant tree line. In one direction, the river formed a natural barrier for her land, another a cluster of trees, interspersed with bracken and shrub, another. It was from somewhere within this area that the gunfire came. For a long moment, she considered running back to her cabin, to find the Henry carbine she always kept in her buggy. It hadn’t been fired since Jude was alive, and she had no idea where extra cartridges were kept. So she squatted and waited and prayed that whoever it was wouldn’t approach her place. But they did. Four men riding shaggy looking mares, their faces cast into deep shadow by the brims of their dusty hats. She flattened herself, putting her cheek against the earth. Perhaps if she remained deathly still, they wouldn’t notice her. They were close now, steering their mounts around the root crop field. She gave up a tiny prayer of thanks for that. “We should go see who is in there.” “Could be they heard the gunfire.” “Could be they have seen us.” These three statements came from three distinctly different voices, one clearly Mexican, one old and gruff, the third much younger, a tinge of fear on the edge of his words. The fourth, when he spoke, was that of their obvious leader. A man well used to giving orders, of others doing as he bid. “If they had heard, we’d see ‘em running, and I’d kill them dead before they opened their blabbering mouths.” “So who lives there, Jonas?” “I don’t know and I don’t care. Maybe they is in town picking up supplies. I don’t see no buggy.” This much was true. Cathy did possess a buggy, but it was stored away in the barn. When she needed to, she rode into town on her colt, Pharaoh. Pharaoh had thrown a shoe some days previously, and the blacksmith was due any day now. She sheltered in the small stable, together with her burro friend. Being out of sight proved another reason to thank God. The riders moved on, the clomping of hooves gradually fading away until, ears straining to hear, Cathy caught the sound of water splashing. They were crossing the river and heading away from her place. She let out a long sigh, rolled over onto her back, and settled herself before climbing to her feet. She gave a look around. Satisfied no one remained behind, she broke into a run. Not towards the house, however. Towards where the gunshots came. In a dip amongst the trees where the harsh warmth of the sun could not penetrate, she found him. Shot. Two times. Once in the left shoulder, once in the chest. He appeared to be dead, the pallor of his flesh waxen, drained of color. He was young, had been handsome, smooth-faced. They had taken his g*n, his hat, his boots, leaving him to bleed out alone in this sad and dreary place. It was the blood that made her stop and take a closer look. Dead don’t bleed. Quickly, she got down on her haunches and felt his neck for a pulse. A tiny gasp escaped from her throat. He was alive. She dressed his wounds as best she could, fetching water from her well, washing away the worst of it before wrapping bandages torn from the bedsheets she’d only recently purchased from the local town’s merchandise store around him. He groaned several times, and she knew this was a good sign. When she put water to his lips, he coughed, and her heart leapt. Returning to the smallholding at a run, she fetched Brandy, the burro. Pharaoh didn’t like that, but Cathy ignored her horse and led the donkey to the trees. There she fashioned a sort of sledge from fallen trees, threading them together in the way Jude had shown her to make wattle fencing. It took her a long time to struggle and place the wounded man on the sledge. Her grim determination saw her through, despite the weight of him. She paused several times to wipe the sweat from her brow but before long he was positioned on the sled and, satisfied, she led Brandy back to the cabin. That night she lay him down by the fire as the fever came, the bullet in his chest the worst of the two. Bathing his brow, she watched him as he writhed around on the cabin floor. She thought he would die and dreaded the thought of having to dig a grave deep enough to deter coyotes. The hard earth would barely cover his body. But he did not die, and the morning dawned to find him breathing, an infection rattling in his chest. She washed away the sweat from his brow, changed the bandages covering his wounds, and made sure the fire was well stacked up. She nursed him for another day before she accepted the inevitable – she would have to cut out the bullets if he were to survive. He drifted in and out of consciousness, lucid moments few and far between. Managing to roll him onto an old piece of canvas, she sharpened one of her kitchen knives, held her breath, and worked on the lesser of the two wounds. It proved a godsend he was unconscious for most of it. The slug, when it came out, looked surprisingly small. She studied it for a long time, marveling how something so insignificant could cause such distress. Setting to the second wound proved a far more laborious, stressful, and difficult task. It was in deep, forcing her to use a different knife with a thinner blade. At one point, he arched his back and bellowed, eyes snapping open, wild and afraid. He tried to sit up, but she pushed him back down, put a wet cloth over his forehead, waited until his spasm subsided, then set to work once more. It took something like twenty minutes to ease the bullet out, although it felt a lot longer. She was exhausted when she managed to lever it free. The blood pulsed freely, but that had to be a good sign, and she packed the wound like the Kiowa had shown her all those years before, cleaning out the wound with some of Jude ’s whisky before making a poultice from dampened, stale bread and herbs. To her astonishment, as the evening wore on, his breathing grew lighter, the perspiration abated, and his almost constant moaning lessened until, finally, it ceased. He slept soundly. The following day, he sat up, face dry, eyes focused. She studied him from the far corner where she stood, the old Spencer in her hands. Who could guess what this man, now recovered, might try to do? His lips, when he spoke, trembled slightly, his voice sounded raucous, the throat dry. “I could do with some water, ma’am, if you could be so kind.” Without any hesitation, she twisted around to where a goatskin gourd stood on the rickety table next to the water pump. She placed it on the floor within his arm’s reach. Not for a single moment did her eyes leave his as she carefully stepped back. He nodded his thanks, lifted the gourd to his lips, and drank fitfully, coughing hoarsely as the water hit his parched mouth. “Take it slow,” she said quietly. Something passed across his eyes as he swallowed some more. A look of gratitude, so overwhelming that the tears came to his eyes and spilt down his cheeks. He looked away, ashamed at this show of emotion. ‘I’m so very grateful for what you have done, ma’am.’ He broke down and sobbed uncontrollably, head on his chest, shoulders heaving with the power of his outpourings. Cathy watched, speechless, in two minds as to what to do. It could be a ploy, of course, to draw her to him, lower her guard so he could pounce, over-power her, and … and then what, she could only speculate. But something about the rawness of his tears made her think that this was no ruse. This was genuine, the sheer relief of being alive causing him to react in such an open, sincere way. “I’m sorry,” he said as the tears abated at last. He dabbed at his eyes with the back of his hand. Pulling a piece of white material from her sleeve, she crossed to him and pushed the makeshift handkerchief into his hand. He mopped at his wet face and smiled his thanks. Stepping away again, Cathy studied him, the way his dark hair flopped over the left eye, the full, feminine mouth, smooth-cheeked, strong jawline not yet sprinkled with the shadow of a beard’s growth. How old could he be? Eighteen? Twenty perhaps? And here he was, in her home, recovering from bullets which should have killed him. Who was he, and what had forced those others to attack him so viciously? He caught her look, and his cheeks reddened slightly. “As soon as I’m able, I’ll be on my way, ma’am. I don’t wish to impose upon your hospitality any more than I need to.” “You’re not imposing,” she said, a slight smile playing across her mouth. “It was me that brought you in. And, besides, you can’t go, not until you have some new boots.” He laughed, the relief palpable. “Ah, yes. They took those, I suppose.” A sudden darkness came over his features. His eyes held hers. ‘Did you see the men who did this to me?’ “No. Only heard them as they rode by.” “But they didn’t see you?” She frowned at the panic in his voice. “No. Don’t worry yourself about that. I was on the ground, well hidden.” His shoulders visibly relaxed, and he lay back in the bed. “Thank you.” “Who were they? Why did they shoot you and leave you to die like that?” She knew it was too soon to ask such searching questions. She had yet to gain his trust and, indeed, for him to gain hers. She held her breath, unable to take back her words, wondering if he would reveal it all or slip into coyness. “We had a falling out,” he said simply, his voice growing distant. “I’m sorry, ma’am. I’m tired. And I need … you know … I need …” “Yes!” she blurted, understanding immediately what he meant. “There is an outhouse round back. Are you sure you can walk?” “If you were to put that carbine away, you could help me. At least to the door of the privy?” He sat up, laughing, and the sound cut through the tension which had settled between them. “We’ll see,” she said, propped the carbine against the wall, and drew back her threadbare cardigan to reveal the Colt Navy stuffed into her skirt waistband. “My husband’s. He taught me how to shoot, saying I’d need to if ever he was away on business and I was left alone.” “Is he away on business now?” “Kind of.” She took a step towards him. “Let’s get you feeling a little more comfortable.” She smiled and put out her hand. He took it after a moment’s hesitation and slipped out from beneath the covers.