"Right then" said the gruff voice as the stage coach door closed.
Amy glanced around the mainstreet of St Jo, her father would never believe that sleepy St Jo was now a big and bustling city.
She had once come here with her father as a young child to visit an elderly aunt who, like her father, had since died.
The wheels ground into action and the lady travelling with her daughter waved out the window to friends as they rounded the corner and headed west.
West, just the sound of the word excited her, had her brother not told her that life only really existed in the west, perhaps that was why she hadn’t heard from him in over six years, perhaps she was dead to him because she was still back in Kansas, well not anymore. Amy was about to start life, she felt sure.
"Are you on your way to meet your gentleman?" asked the mother breaking into her thoughts.
Amy shook her head she knew where she was going but she wasn’t going to divulge it to anyone until she got there for fear of breaking the spell of anticipation.
"No mam, I’m looking to take a position of School mam." It wasn’t completely a lie, she had seen an advertisement for a school teacher in Sweetwater and if things didn’tgo as planned it was good as a backup option.
"Pa’s built us a house" said the daughter, Amy guessed her to be about five. Amy smiled and thought "Please don’t talk to me I just want to watch this beautiful land".
The dust of the town had passed and there were very few homes out here, just track and pararie, how she longed to race Jojo through the long grass but her childhood companion was too old for the journey and had been left with a father who had wanted a gentle horse for his daughter to learn to ride on. Besides the bay was too easily identified, a risk she couldn’t take.
The miles flowed by and the heat increased, the stops were short as they were running behind time, her legs felt stiff and her eyelids heavy so she leaned back against the seat to rest her eyes a little.
Startled by the gun shot she opened her eyes, the coach lurched to a halt. Instinctively she scanned the cannon.
High up on a sheer rock she saw a glimmer of metal, then another a little lower down.
"Crawl out and climb under coach" she ordered the mother and child, the mother hesitated then moved towards the door facing away from the rock face.
Amy followed "There’s at least two" she called to the driver then seeing no movement from the old man she crawled towards the front of the coach.
"Darn" she muttered under her breathe upon seeing the growing bloodstain on his shirt.
She heard another shot as she reached up and pulled down the loaded rifle that the driver had not had the time to use, from the seat.
Reaching under her skirts she removed the colt she hadstrapped to her thigh before leaving St Jo.
The metal glimmered again on the lower rock, Amy rounded the back of the wagon and fired, she could hear the child whimpering under the coach and the mother’s soft soothing words disguising her internal panic.
The shot found its mark and the body slid to the rock just below. The higher one had either moved or was lying low, she inspected another ridge near by.
Another man moved near the ground, Amy shot with an accuracy that would have made her brother proud, suddenly another stood uppoised to shoot, as fast as a gunfighter Amy dropped him too.
The glimmer on a ledge caught her eye, the pistol wouldn’t reach there and there was only one shot in the rifle, she couldn’t afford to miss.
A shot rang out from the ridge causing wood to splinter on the coach, the child wailed and this time the mother joined in.
The force of the exploding rifle threw her back a few paces but her mission was accomplished, she let out a sigh and was thankful of her childhood around guns, another shot rang out from behind her on the opposite side of the canyon she spun around in a panic in time to see a man fall to the ground and a buck-skinned figure emerge from the growth.
"You alright Miss" speechless from the shock of nearly being shot from behind Amy just nodded.
How many times had she been warned to check the grass behind her when play fighting as a child and now her childhood weakness had nearly made her lose her life.
"I’m William F Cody, mam, I ride for the Pony Express. That was some sharp shooting back there. Where’d a lady like you learn to shoot like that?"
"My brother""He must be some gunman himself"
"Uh huh" Amy nodded and watched the mother cautiously look out from under the coach.
"Its safe to come out""Where were you headin’?"
"Sweetwater" replied the mother
" What did they want?"
"Hard to say. Probably money, there’s a lot coming west on the stage these days".
He glanced towards a rider coming through the canyon. "Don’t worry. He’s my partner, he just went up top when we heard the shots and I headed down here"
"Any more up there?" he called to his companion.
" Nup, only dead ones" was the answer. Amy winced to look into the sunlight to seethe face of the most recent arrival.
"Jimmy?" she asked "Oh my goodness". Amy ran and threw herself at the stranger who was completely taken off guard.
"Amy, is that you? What happened to you? Your all grown up"he laughed in disbelief as he swung her off the ground."What are you doing here? Why aren’t you in Kansas?"
"Someone once told me you had to come out west to really live. And look what happened, I nearly wound up dead"
"This is just great. I save her life and she runs and hugs you. How d’ya do it Hickok?"
The mother and child had retreated from the scorching sun back into the coach andwatched the proceedings from there.
"Cody, I’d like you to meet my little sister, Amy" Jimmy stated with pride.
"I should’ve known from that shooting that you were the big brother" Cody smiled in amusement.
"Did he really save your life?" asked Jimmy with more than a note of skepticism inhis voice.
"Sure did" Amy smiled at Cody.
Jimmy raised his eyebrows and nodded thoughtfully then said "Forgot to look behind you eh"
Amy laughed and hung her head in mock embarrassment.
"Never did learn
that lesson did ya?"
"About 6 hours by coach" replied Cody as he checked the driver for signs
of life. "Dead?" asked Jimmy.
"Uh huh. Your gonna need a new driver if you’re gonna get to town
before nightfall
Mam. I don’t mind obliging." Cody winked at Amy then glanced at the frowning
Jimmy. "How about you ride on ahead and tell the Marshall and I’ll drive. Me
and Amy need
to talk." Jimmy replied. Now it was Amy’s turn to frown, this wasn’t
quite the way
she had hoped to meet Jimmy and she certainly wasn’t ready to explain
what she was doing here.
After a few ineffectual groans Cody retreated to the bush then
reappeared briefly
upon his horse before waving and galloping up the canyon out of sight.
Meanwhile
Jimmy tethered his horse to the back of the carriage and signaled Amy to
climb up
front. She sighed as she obeyed, what was the use of arguing, he always
won thesetypes of arguments and besides it would be good to be near him. She
felt sure that
no-one could hurt her if she was beside Jimmy. The coach leaned under
the weight of
Jimmy who was lifting the dead driver off the seat and fastening him
over the saddle
of his own horse. The coach leaned again as Jimmy hoisted himself into
the driver’s
seat. Amy was fascinated with Jimmy’s sense of ease around dead people, he had
hardly thought twice about throwing the poor driver over his shoulder to
place him on
the horse. Amy admitted that while she was not like most girls she had met that
would have had a faint spell if faced with shooting and death she had,
nonetheless,
been careful not to touch or let her skirts touch the dead man when she
had climbedup to the front seat. Jimmy clicked the horses to go and the resumed
their trip at aleisurely pace.
"You still got the gun?" Jimmy asked. Amy nodded and revealed the gun from her
skirt folds for him to see. "Is it loaded?" "Nope"
"Here" with one hand Jimmy unfastened his gun belt and handed it to her "Can you
remember how to reload?"
"I think so" she said sarcastically as she began removing the cartridges
from the beltand sliding them into the colt. "Some things you never forget"
"What are you doing out here?" he said asking the question that they
both had known was coming.
"Other things you forget straight away" she answered sharply.
"Fine, don’t tell me, but you are getting right back on the stage when
we get to town and heading back to where you came from."
"Don’t you think I would be safer with you? After all I nearly got
killed taking the stage today" "You’ve got the colt." he replied expressionless.
"I’m not going back" stated Amy "You can put me on a coach but you can’t
guarantee that I won’t get off and head west again at the next stop. Next time
I’ll be more
careful to avoid you!". She thrust her chin up and looked away from him
knowing that she was going to get her own way soon.
As she expected Jimmy sighed in resignation.
"If your set on moving west you might as well come with me. At least
I’ll be able to
keep you out of trouble" he said. Amy smiled, careful not to let him see. Jimmy
looked at the back of his sister’s turned head and presumed that the
lack of response
meant that she was sulking. Why did his sister have to be so fiercely
independent,
most people’s sisters were quiet and polite and eager to please their
much loved big brothers but this one just tried her darndest to make his life
difficult, she always had
from the moment she could first walk. She was the only person from his
early life that he had truly missed when he had moved west. As a child she had
followed him
everywhere, wanting to do everything he was doing without a thought of
caution. But it
was he who had been careful not to leave her too far behind when they
went riding
until she was able to beat him everytime. And it was he who had taught her to use a gun
incase she accidentally blew her off fingers trying to teach herself.
He had
celebrated her success with a pistol over the boys of the town. It was
also Jimmy who
would protect her from the other children when they teased her about her
boyishness
and she tried to fight all of them at once. Jimmy had to admit that the
traits that made
her difficult were the same ones that made him proud of his little
sister, what she
lacked in sense she made up for in spunk. He glanced at the womanly
figure sitting
beside him, her youth was still apparent but her mannerisms had become
more mature
and thoughtful, more like their mother’s, at least they were when she
wasn’t sulkinglike a child as she was at this moment. * * * * * * * * * * *
It was almost dark by the time they reached Senoa. Amy and Jimmy had
spoken very little, mostly because Amy was overcome by the beauty of her
surroundings and
Jimmy was trying to figure out what exactly he was going to do with his
sister once
they reached Sweetwater - and how he was going to get her there in the
first place.
They were greeted by the Marshall and his Deputy, who Amy felt looked
like he’d run
to his mother at the first sign of trouble. Cody swaggered behind them
grinning.
"D’ja get lost Hickok or stop for a sleep?" Jimmy glared at him in reply
and tipped his hat to the lawmen.
" Second incident this week" said the Marshall shaking his head "No-one knows
exactly what they want but innocent people keep gettin’ killed!"
" I heard some men in the saloon talking about gun shipments to the
Indians, maybe they heard about it too."
contributed the fresh faced Deputy. Amy wanted to ask him
if he was old enough to go to the saloon but thought the better of it
since Jimmy was beside her.
"I’d say that was what they were looking for" agreed Cody "but who’s
sending rifles to the Indians, that seems to be encouraging trouble don’t it?"
At that moment a rider came galloping towards them "Murphy’s place is on
fire and there were shots fired" he shouted.
"Come on" called the Marshal as he grabbed a nearby horse from the yard and
jumped on bareback. "Can you boys help?" Cody had already mounted a horse and
was beginning to follow the rider. Jimmy turned to Amy, "Go to the Hotel
and wait for me to come back" Amy started to protest "Now!" he demanded as he
rode off with
the others. Amy pulled her skirt as she walked to the hotel "Stupid
skirt" she muttered
to herself, if she had been better dressed she would have mounted a
horse and gonewith them.
She climbed the stairs with the key that the lady had given her and
opened the door
and lay down on the bed looking up at the moldy ceiling. Her stomach growled and
she regretted declining the meal that the woman had offered her when she
booked inbut the thought of sitting with all those people didn’t really appeal
tonight. She
reviewed the day in her head trying to remember how she had pictured meeting
Jimmy again, it certainly hadn’t been like this but at least she had
what she wanted,
almost. Her mind drifted back to Kansas and the events of the past
weeks, she had
tried to forget about it but something the Deputy said about the guns
seemed familiar.
Amy remembered Ethan boasting to his friends about how easy it would be to get
guns to the South through the Indian traders who often travelled down
that way. Amy
felt ill thinking about Ethan and, hearing the clatter of hoofs, moved
to the window. She could tell from their body language that the mission had been
fruitless.
Downstairs the men were describing the scene, by the time they arrived
the barn had
been destroyed and the house was burning too strongly to be stopped. The Murphys
had lost most of their possessions but no one had been hurt except Mr Murphy who
had burnt his arm trying to save the barn.
" Who fired the shots?" asked Amy, her mind very much on the subject of
guns still. "Probably some South supporters, Murphy is rumored to be part of the
underground
railroad. He’s always receiving threats." replied the Marshall. "Well,
you folks better
be heading for a sleep if you’re to travel to Sweetwater tomorrow."
"Come on" Jimmy gently directed his sister towards the staircase. Amy rolled her
eyes in disgust. Cody shook his head trying not to laugh, there was
definitely a family resemblance between those two.
Tell the author what you think of the story!!!!
