Rachel thought once Boone knew about the baby, she’d be able to settle down and be content. But, since she hadn’t planned to tell him until he was free and since he was still in jail, she remained restless. Getting Boone released, not hung, was the main worry she carried, but there were others. Money was another. She’d paid a month’s rent when she rented the rooms, and before their wedding day, Boone paid another four months. He’d urged her to hide what money he had with Ezekiel’s help, and they had tucked it into the lining at the bottom of her trunk. When they hid it away, there had been some of his last wages along with his faro winnings, but it hadn’t been as much as before. Furnishing the rooms had taken more than half of it, by her reckoning.
The needs of their household were simple. Ezekiel bought most of the food with his wages from the livery stable and hunted a lot of the meat. He gave her money to buy other things, like soap when needed, but she worried about running out of cash. Her small stash had been spent before she married.
On the first night that Moses Wilson shared their supper table, he broached the question of finances. “How are you fixed for money?” he’d asked Rachel over the fried rabbit dinner she served with potatoes and beans.
“Boone had a bit,” she told him. “But we spent a great deal of it furnishing this place, for we needed everything from pots and pans to linens.”
“Is it all gone?”
Ezekiel spoke up. “No, it’s not, Moses. I been spending what I can from what I earn over at the livery. Are you in need?”
Moses shook his head. “No, I have a little, enough for my needs and some skill at cards. I can do some work, too, if need be. I just wanted to know how y’all are fixed.”
“Don’t be worrying about money,” Liam said. He had joined them for the meal, so there were four at the table. “I’ve got enough scratch to help if need be. We need to get Boone out of that hell hole, though.”
His words encouraged Rachel, and she managed a smile.
“Fill me on what you think happened, both with some madman shooting my brother and the deputy killing this blacksmith,” Moses said. “I need all the details you have, then I’ll go out digging for the truth.”
Liam provided the information which Rachel had heard several times. It was apparent that Sheriff Johnson had a grudge against Boone, although no one knew exactly why. When he’d mentioned the battle at Sharpsburg, where his brother had died, the Sheriff seemed to suggest that Boone was responsible. Rachel thought there was more there as well, but she didn’t know what. Nor could she figure out why the deputy would have killed Kurtz, although she knew firsthand what an unpleasant man he’d been. He had few friends.
“You’d best go wary,” Liam told him. “If you spook the sheriff, he’ll take it out on Boone or hang him. That gallows gets closer to done every day despite the weather.”
The talk of the gallows upset Rachel, and since everyone had finished eating, she cleared the table and busied herself with the dishes. Her back ached, and so did her head. Fatigue crept over her, and she longed to finish so she could sit down again or, even better, lie down.
A pair of hands reached from behind her and picked up a dish to scrub. “Let me help,” Moses said.
His offer surprised her. “It’s women’s work,” she said.
“My Ma has more sons, not daughters,” he told her. “We all learned early to help. I’ve helped Ma many times in the kitchen. Go sit down. I promised Boone I’d watch out for you.”
Rachel almost refused, then decided to accept his help. She dried her hands and turned to him. “Thank you. I shouldn’t – you must be tired yourself. You came a long way to get here.”
“I spent last night at the Double B,” he told her. “The rest of it was very long and very hard, but today wasn’t a bad ride.”
She nodded. “I liked the ranch very much.”
“It’s a fine place.”
Standing beside him, she remarked on what she’d noticed before. “You do favor Boone, don’t you?”
To her eyes, he stood as tall and was built much the same. From the back, she would have taken him to be Boone, she thought. His face was similar, even more so than Ezekiel’s, with the same eyes and a solid chin.
Moses laughed. “I do, for my sins, the most of any of us, I reckon. Ezekiel does, too, but maybe not as much as me. Jacob, back home, does the most. That sheriff mistook me for Boone when I first hit town.”
No one had told her. “He did? What did he do?”
“Threatened to shoot me for escaping until Liam and Zeke showed up,” he told her. “That’s why he let me get Boone cleaned up.”
As he spoke, he washed and scrubbed dishes, then pans, his hands buried in the water she’d heated. She’d expected him to be clumsy, but he was efficient. Rachel watched for a short time, then decided he was doing a good job so she sat down at the table with a sigh. What she really wanted was to go to bed, stretch out under the covers, and sleep until morning. Instead, she listened to the men talk as they spun theories about how to free Boone until she became drowsy.
“Rachel,” Moses said, his hand on her shoulder. “Go to bed. You’re falling asleep in the chair. I’m going myself.”
“I will, then,” she told Moses. Rachel wanted to be up early to cook for Boone, a process which now often took longer if she had to stop and be sick. She had venison to cook, thanks to Ezekiel’s hunting and more mouths to feed. Most of it hung in a smokehouse where he’d wrangled space, but there was a haunch to prepare, one that would feed them all.
Liam had gone back to the hotel the night before, and Ezekiel, after bringing up two buckets of water from the communal pump, had gone to the livery. Moses remained asleep, snoring, which Rachel liked. It made her feel less alone. As dawn unfolded over Laredo, she busied her hands, preparing a meal she would first deliver to Boone and then share with the others later in the day.
Cooking usually brightened her mood, but this time, the meat smelled gamey and of blood, which turned her stomach. She vomited twice before she got it seasoned, browned, and roasting. Moses rushed into the kitchen as she puked for the last time in the farthest corner away from the food.
She heard his footsteps and managed to say, “Don’t fret, I’m all right.”
“I’d rather not answer to Boone if you’re sick,” he said.
“It’s the shape I’m in,” Rachel replied, alluding to her pregnancy. “From what Ezekiel said, you ought to be familiar from your sister-in-law.”
“I wasn’t told to watch out for her,” he told her with a chuckle. “Boone may have been gone from the family a long time, but he’s still my brother. When our daddy died, he took on the responsibility of us all, and he worried plenty. I can see you mean the world to him and I promised to see to you until he can.”
“I’d say you know him well,” she answered with a smile.
“You likely know him better,” Moses said. “Ezekiel more than me now ‘cause he’s been here longer. But Boone is still Boone – more now than when he came home from the war. When we first got that wire that he’d been shot and was expected to die, it hit us hard. I near about came then, but we figured – Ma and me – that he’d live or die long before I could get here. He’s in a poor place now, but I cain’t hardly imagine how bad he was then.”
Rachel didn’t like to think about it, even now. “He came close to dying,” she said. “But I could fight that. I can’t do anything about whether or not he’s hanged, and that scares me.”
“I’ll do everything I can,” Moses assured her. “I told our Ma he wouldn’t die from being shot, and he didn’t. I’m telling you now that he won’t hang, either.”
His optimism pleased her and lightened her heavy heart a small fraction.
“I want to believe that.”
“What are you cooking with the venison?”
“I thought I’d do potatoes, carrots, and onions,” Rachel told him.
“If you made noodles, Boone would be over the moon,” Moses said. “It’s one of his favorites.”
“Ezekiel said his favorite is chicken and dumplings.”
Moses laughed. “It is, but he fancies noodles, too, and I doubt much he’s had any for some time. Fact is, I wouldn’t mind a bit of them myself.”
Noodles were simple to make, so Rachel did, with nothing more than eggs, flour, and salt. It would take a little longer since they’d have to dry first, but she didn’t mind and figured if the meal arrived a bit later, Boone wouldn’t care either.
It was almost noon when she set out for the jail with Boone’s dinner and a bottle of hot coffee. Moses accompanied her. Boone stood at the bars, waiting, his forehead creased with a worried frown, but when he saw Rachel, he smiled.
“I started to fear you weren’t coming,” he told her. “Are you well?”
She nodded and handed the plate through the narrow slot. “I was cooking. It’s venison – Ezekiel got a deer.”
He lifted the checkered napkin from the plate and grinned. “Venison and noodles!”
“It was my idea,” Moses told his brother. “She was gonna make taters and carrots.”
“That would have worked,” Boone replied. “But I’ve had a hankering for noodles. What’s the day? Is it March?”
Although there was a calendar hung on the wall, Rachel saw it was probably out of Boone’s line of vision.
“It is, today’s the third of March and a Friday,” she told him, wondering why it mattered. It meant that on the 13th, Boone would have spent three long months behind bars and most of their marriage.
“Zeke’s birthday is the 5th,” he said. “I reckoned since it’s the first time I’ve been near him on the day in years, we might ought to do something to mark it.”
“I could cook one of his favorites – what does he like?”
“He’s fond of pudding,” Boone said. “Or pie. Maybe you could take a bit of money and get him a gift, maybe a pocket knife. Man can always use one.”
Rachel nodded. “I can do both, most likely. He’ll be sixteen?”
“He will, and I recollect when he was born – makes me feel like an old man.”
She laughed. “You’re not, Boone.”
Although he was thinner and despite being clean as well as a bit worse for wear, Boone remained more cheerful than he had been, she thought, but the sheriff was in high spirits, and that concerned her. Johnson sat at his desk whistling off-key with an odd look on his normally stern face. Although he hadn’t spoken when they arrived, Boone had barely finished his meal when Johnson rose and came over to stand within a few feet of Rachel.
“He’s eaten, so you need to go,” he said. A weird grin touched his lips. “I can’t have you hanging around the jailhouse. Besides, Mrs. Wilson, your husband will swing soon – the gallows is almost finished, as you might have noticed.”
She hadn’t, but his words caused a sharp dismay. She bit her lip hard in her effort not to reply to avoid providing him any additional ammunition. Her throat ached with unshed tears, but Rachel refused to give him the satisfaction. Boone’s expression shifted, and he handed her the plate.
“It tasted fine, honey,” he said, but from the look on his face, he might have well as eaten barbed wire or ground glass.
“Might as well tell her what you want for your last meal,” the sheriff said. “Give her time to plan it all out. I don’t expect to wait past next Friday or Saturday at the latest. Saturday hangings usually draw a crowd.”
If she hadn’t reached out to grip the bars with one hand and Boone’s fingers with the other, Rachel would have fallen to the floor. She schooled her face to remain calm, for Boone’s sake.
“That ain’t happening,” Moses said, although he had gone pale. “My brother will walk free before then.”
Johnson laughed, but there was nothing merry about the sound. It was dark and bitter, like rotten walnut hulls. He said no more, having spewed his poison and spread his damage, but returned to his desk and began to whistle once again. This time, although still out of tune, Rachel recognized it as “John Brown’s Body,” a Union song, so she knew it was chosen on purpose to devil Boone.
“I was at Antietam, too,” he remarked. “That’s where my brother fell and where you killed him, Reb. The day I watch you hang will be sweet vengeance.”
“Vengeance is mine, I will repay, saith the Lord,” Moses quoted from the Book of Romans. “Best you not forget that, lawman.”
If a look could kill, Moses would have dropped dead onto the floor with the power of Johnson’s glare.
“Don’t mind him, Boone,” he said in a quieter voice. “We’d best go, but it ain’t over, so don’t lose heart.”
Boone stared at them both with anguish in his eyes. Rachel managed to touch his cheek through the bars. “I love you, Boone Wilson,” she said. “Remember, entreat me not to leave thee.”
A single tear escaped from one eye. “I love you, honey,” he said, his voice cracked and broken. “But it’d be best for you and the child if you did.”