This Loving Land - Dorothy Garlock [112]
“Don’t! Don’t . . . please. . . .”
“Don’t!” he mocked. “Get in the wagon!”
“I won’t.” Summer tried to firm her quivering voice. “Didn’t Sadie give you the letter?”
“I don’t give a goddam for a letter! Now get in the wagon or I’ll let loose with this shotgun and blast those horses to hell! Those folks will spend the night out here on the prairie.” He lifted the gun cradled in his arms, the muzzle pointed at the coach horses. “I still got a thumb to pull the trigger.”
The tension in him was so strong that she was shaking from the impact of it.
“You wouldn’t! You couldn’t be so cruel.”
“Cruel? You’ve put me through five days of hell. In about thirty seconds, you’re going to see how cruel I am.”
“Don’t make me do this, Slater. Please, don’t make me.”
For the first time, she looked him full in the face. It was a face she didn’t know, and her eyes widened as she stared at him. His eyes were sunken and blazed with bitterness. His cheekbones stood above hollowed cheeks shadowed with a day’s growth of beard, a vein in his temple stood out prominently and throbbed with each beat of his heart. It was the boniness of his face, the wolfish snarl of his twisted mouth that held her in acute fear. The scraping of metal, as he cocked the gun, put her weak legs into motion, and she moved to the back of the wagon and crawled in over the tailgate. Almost as soon as she sank down on the plank floor and covered her face with her hands, she heard the thump of her trunk as it was dumped down beside her. The wagon lurched, the team making a full circle, before beginning a steady, rolling pace.
Summer sat crunched in the corner of the jolting wagon, her mind going in a thousand directions. How was she going to tell him? How was she going to spare him the shame and the hurt of knowing he had shared with his sister the most intimate act a man can share with a woman? How could she tell him that she was going to have his child? A human being that more than likely would be deformed, an idiot!
The sun beat down mercilessly on her head and the soft skin of the back of her neck. She was so steeped in her own misery she didn’t notice. She was almost drowsy when Slater’s harsh voice broke the silence.
“Put your hat on. You’ll be sick from the sun.”
She raised her head and groped blindly for her hat because her eyes were blinded by the brightness of the sun. After a few minutes, she glanced at him. His face was turned away from her so she was free to look at him. He lay sprawled in the sling, one knee bent, booted foot resting on the floor, bandaged hands laying at his sides. An umbrella, of sorts, had been rigged to shade the upper part of his body. He was emaciated. It didn’t seem possible a person could have lost so much weight in so short a time.
The wagon was moving slowly. Bulldog was letting the tired horses plod along. Jack rode a little ahead, slumped in the saddle. It was quiet. So terribly quiet.
Evening came and it was a welcome relief from the merciless sun. An exhausted Slater had slept the afternoon away. Ignored by Jack and Bulldog, Summer leaned her head back against her trunk and tried not to think of the ordeal ahead of her.
It was still light, but a few stars had made their appearance, when they reached the stage stop by the creek. Bulldog pulled the team to a stop and said a few low words to Jack. The wagon turned and they went alongside the creek for a few rods before stopping. Bulldog climbed stiffly from the wagon seat.
“We’ll camp here,” be announced, to no one in particular.
Summer had sat for so long that she moved slowly at first, stretching her legs out in front of her. She glanced at Slater. His face was turned toward her and his lids were not completely closed. He had been watching her, was watching her! Her face burned with embarrassment, then resentment, for being blamed for a situation that wasn’t any more her fault than his.
Bulldog led the team to water. After waiting patiently for them to drink their fill, he staked them out. They immediately rolled