“You have a very pessimistic outlook on life. It would be the best thing for both of us if she were to turn back. Now, are you coming with me or not?”
“I wouldn’t miss this for the world. Maybe she’ll offer us somethin’ to eat, but I sure hope she don’t sing. I sure do hate opery.”
’Ring straightened his uniform, adjusted the heavy, long saber at his side. “Let’s get this over with. I have many things to do back at the fort.”
“Like keepin’ ol’ man Harrison from killin’ you?”
’Ring didn’t answer as he mounted his horse.
Chapter 2
Maddie pulled the photograph of her little sister from the trunk and looked at it. She was so absorbed, she didn’t hear Edith enter the tent.
“You ain’t gonna start cryin’, are you?” Edith said as she spread a blanket over the hard cot that was Maddie’s bed.
“Of course not!” Maddie snapped. “Have you cooked anything yet? I’m starved.”
Edith pushed a strand of dishwater-blonde hair out of her eyes. Neither it nor her dress was too clean. “You thinkin’ of changin’ your mind?”
“No, I’m not. I’ve never considered doing anything but what I have to. If I have to sing for a bunch of dirty, thieving, illiterate miners in order to save my sister, I’ll do it.” Maddie looked at this woman, who was part maid, part companion, part pain-in-the-neck to her. “You aren’t getting cold feet, are you?”
“Ain’t me who’s got a sister they’re gonna kill and, besides, I wouldn’t care if they did hold my sister. I’m plannin’ to get me a rich gold miner and make him marry me and set me up for life.”
Maddie looked at the photograph once more, then put it away. “I just want to get this done as quickly as possible and get my sister back. Six camps. That’s all I have to do, and then she’ll be returned to me.”
“Yeah, well, you hope. I don’t know why you trust them so much.”
“General Yovington promised he’d help me, and he’s the one I trust. When this is all over, he’s going to help me prosecute her kidnappers.”
“You have a lot more faith in men than I do,” Edith said, jerking the bed covers. “You ready to—” She stopped as she saw a large, dark form at the tent flap. “He’s here again.”
Maddie looked up, then slipped out of the tent. She returned in minutes. “There may be some trouble,” she said to Edith. “Be very cautious tonight.”
An hour later, just as Maddie w
as finishing her dinner, she looked up to see two soldiers approaching. Or, she thought, perhaps a soldier and a half, as one man was splendidly dressed in a perfectly cut, perfect-fitting uniform, sitting on top of a horse that must have bloodlines back to Adam’s horse. The other man, half the size of the first one, looked as though he’d made his shirt out of a bunch of dirty rags. There were large patch pockets sewn all over the front of the shirt, and each pocket seemed to be bulging.
“Hello,” she said, smiling. “You are just in time to join me for a cup of tea and perhaps a piece of apple pie.”
The larger man, who Maddie could now see was a very handsome man, with dark hair curling from under the broad brim of his hat, dark, frowning eyes, heavy dark brows, and a thick dark mustache, just scowled at her.
“Real tea?” the smaller man asked, his brown skin crinkling as he spoke. One of his incisors was missing. “Real apples? Real pie?”
“Why, yes, of course. Please share it with me.” He was off his horse in a second, before Maddie could pour the tea. When he took the cup, his hand trembled a bit in anticipation. She poured another cup and held it out. “Captain,” she said to the younger man, noting his rank by the double silver bars on his shoulders.
He ignored the tea and rode his horse very close to the table. Glaring down from atop the enormous horse, he seemed to be twelve feet tall, she thought, and felt a cramp in her neck as she looked up at him.
“You’re LaReina?”
He had a nice voice but not a nice tone to it. “Yes.” She smiled as graciously as possible, trying to ignore the cramp in her neck. “LaReina is my stage name. My name is actually—”
She didn’t get to finish, as the man’s horse did a sidestep and she had to keep the dishes from tipping over.
“Quiet, Satan,” the man said, and brought the big horse under control.
To her right the small man choked on his tea.
“Are you all right?”