I don’t sleep as soundly as I have on the first few nights. I have too many con-cerns about my future running through my head. The bunkhouse is also a noisy place, with all the snoring and coughing and spluttering. Being uneasy of mind anyway, those noises grate on my nerves like there’s a steam engine braking in my head. But finally I do doze off.
The sky is black as pitch and the moon is shining bright when I snap awake again. Someone is slinking around the foot of my bed. I can’t see clearly, but by his movements—lifting and setting things aside—he seems to be looking for something. The silhouette of his head in the moonlight tells me it’s Cyrus Jones.
“Cyrus?”
He stiffens before lowering what’s in his hands. “Charlie, I’m just making a run for the outhouse. Go back to sleep.” The door opens and Cyrus Jones leaves. I fall asleep again.
It’s Cyrus crowing at the top of his scrawny lungs that wakes me the next morning. He lets out a holler from where he stands between the bunks.
“I been robbed!” he bellows louder than a foghorn on a ship, causing me and the McKays to jump from our sleep. “Robbed o’ my wages for the last few days. Which one of you layabouts is a thief?!”
Danny and Donald are immediately out of their bunks and trying to calm him. Cyrus pulls his empty pockets from his trousers—two dirty, empty cotton triangles hanging from his hips. “Not a penny to show for all the hard work I done. What kind of low-down scoundrel would rob what was owed an old man?” His eyes skim the three of us in the bunkhouse, twice over. Eventually, of course, they settle on me. He thrusts his left arm toward me, wagging his one whole finger inches from my face. “A Home boy. That’s who’d rob an injured old man without a defense. A mangy street urchin who’s used to scrabblin’ and stealin’ and don’t think twice about it, that’s who. Boys, I suggest you check your own earnings.”
At Cyrus’s suggestion, Donald lifts a stocking from his pack, where he must have stored his stash of money. He reaches into the toe to discover it’s gone. Danny roots through a bundled handkerchief. He also finds his money missing. They all three turn to me.
Danny addresses me in a most unkindly way. “Why, you filthy little thief! What’d you take us for—thinking we were so stupid you could just rob us blind?”
“Cyrus,” I say helplessly, “you know I don’t have it in me. What are you trying to tell the McKays?”
“Don’t have it in you!” Donald repeats, close to my face. “Didn’t we just learn a few days ago you’re accused of murder? I’d say you have it in you as much as Jesse James.”
Cyrus marches to the end of his bunk, where he picks up the ice hatchet that’s leaning against the wall. He turns back to me. “A kind old fellow like me takes the likes of you under his wing and gets paid back by being taken advantage of. Sit down,” he says, pointing to my own bunk with the handle of the axe. “On your bunk there, boy.” Once I do, Cyrus makes a show of sitting on a chair across the room, positioning it so it blocks the door. He lays the axe across his knees. “McKays, why don’t you go get our employer and let him know what a common criminal he’s hired. I’ll wait here and guard the boy.”
The McKays are hesitant to leave us alone. Danny questions Cyrus on how he’ll manage if I jump him. “I mean, seeing as you’re incapacitated with missing fingers,” he gently explains.
“I have no intention of jumping him,” I firmly tell him.
Danny gives me a nasty look to tell me he isn’t speaking to me.
“I don’t believe he will,” Cyrus says. “There’s too many of us about. It’s not like he’s all alone with me, as he was with that fellow he’s accused of murdering.”
After assuring themselves there are no other weapons near at hand, the McKays agree and head for Mr. Appleton’s house.
“Why are you doing this?” I ask Cyrus as soon as I hear their footsteps receding toward the farmhouse.
With the McKays gone, Cyrus Jones quits performing and turns more into himself. “I didn’t really want to, Charlie, but I have to take my opportunities where they present themselves. For a fellow with no fingers, finding money can be a bit of a chore. I was able to get some cash and now I’m ready to move on.” From the folds of his clothes he brings forth a small sack. He shakes it. It jangles with coins. “You see, being who you are and the circumstances you come from, you’re just particularly easy to blame. And I knew the McKay cousins would be quick to accept you were the thieving kind. So now I got to leave, now that my money bag is full. But I’ll tell you what, I’ll give you a head start if you want to take off now. They’re going to be after you full force once Mr. Appleton discovers his jar of silver is empty too.”
I shake my head. “Well, Cyrus Jones, that’s mighty kind of you.”
“The way things are sitting, it’s the best I can do. You go ahead and strike out now. I’ll wait until I see them coming back before I start hollering. I’ll tell them you overpowered me.” He makes a pretense of clutching his fingerless hands about his neck. He laughs. “Being the beast that you are.”
I know Cyrus is leaving me no choice. Grabbing my rucksack, I head for the door.
“Oh, and Charlie? You’ll want to keep low for a while. And another thing—it might be wise to use a different name.”
I’m a good ways down the trail, ready to duck into the woods at any moment, when I hear Cyrus chirping, “That no-good Home boy—he struck out and got away!”
After cutting off the trail into the bush, I plod through snow that’s drifted knee-deep. I sprint across the bald, open spots where it’s blown clear. Once I meet up with the railroad track, I follow it—it’s easier than hiking through heavy snow.
After running full out for nearly an hour, I stop to catch my breath. The voices of the McKays had faded sometime before—they were driving horses and cutters and would have been forced to keep to the main trail.
A column of smoke wafts into the sky a mile or so in the distance. Another small building lies straight ahead. I shield my eyes to protect them from the glare of the bright sun on the white fields. There’s no smoke, which makes me think it’s to store grain and will be safe to hide out in until I can gather my thoughts and decide what to do next.
My eyes are full of reflected sunlight as I near the building. I blink. It’s a railroad shed. The door is unlocked. Inside is a handcar of the type railroad workers use for inspecting the tracks. I have no intention of stealing it, but I can see no harm in borrowing it for an hour or two. It isn’t in use, so it won’t likely cause an inconvenience. And when I’m done, I’ll leave it parked so it can easily be found on a sidetrack. It sure will be useful in putting some distance between me and the McKays and Buck Brooks.
I walk once around the handcar, inspecting what kind of vehicle I’m about to drive. After climbing on the platform, I release the brake and slowly work the pump handle up and down. The car creaks and groans like a metal giant waking, complaining at having to move out of the shed. But once the gears and grease warm up, I get it started along the rails that meet up with the main track.
A few more good pumps and it isn’t long before I’m whirring along the track, making my way across fields that would take me hours to cover on foot. I gain speed and I’m soon flying past the homestead I’d spotted not fifteen minutes earlier. The track ahead appears clear and good.
I soon have a rhythm to my strokes. I pick up speed going down the long slopes, although I have to pump with all I have to make it up the rises now that the land is beginning to swell. I’m within sight of the foothills of the Rocky Mountains.
It’s desolate country. I’ve passed only a few lonely homesteads in the space of a couple of hours when I realize my stomach is complaining again. After coming to a stop on a level stretch, I open my rucksack and, blimey!—if that Cyrus Jones hasn’t gone and consumed every morsel of food I had. I check my stocking where I’d stored my own wages for cutting ice. The low-down thief has cleaned me out of my money too! I’m not sure why I thought he would have been kind enough to spare me when he’d pilfered the McKays’ wages as well as Mr. Appleton’s silver. I guess I’d just considered it was humiliation enough to be blamed for the thefts. Well, there’s nothing to do but continue along and hope I’ll find work of some sort ahead. I begin working the pump handle.
Once I’m soaring along again, I don’t think much about how fun it is anymore. I can’t enjoy it with the knowledge of what Cyrus has done seething away inside me. But the land is now flat and open, so I race along for a few more uneventful hours.
I’m shooting across the open plain when I glance down into a coulee. When I look up again, ten feet in front of me, where the north wind has cleared a passage across the prairie, is a drift nearly six feet high. Immediately throwing on the brake, I attempt a screeching, squealing stop. Despite my efforts, I plow into it. I’m thankful not a soul is around to witness my performance, because it would be awfully embarrassing. After scooping snow from my eyes and rubbing my cold, bruised nose, I step off the handcar. I follow the drift fifteen or so feet down the length of the track. Having nothing to shovel it with, I have no choice but to set out on foot again.
For most of the afternoon, I follow animal trails; the tracks lead across the open prairie, along the ridge of the coulee and eventually down into a shallow valley. It’s easier walking where there are trees and the snow hasn’t had the opportunity to drift. The smell of wood smoke becomes stronger, and I note areas where footprints left by treaded boots mingle with those of deer, coyote and elk. I’m nearing a settlement of some type. I work my way up to the open plain again.
I’ve walked another two or three hours when dark begins to settle in. I am tuckered out and in need of a warm spot to sit for a while. Thirty minutes later I come upon a schoolhouse. If I can just shut my eyes and think, even for an hour, I’ll be refreshed and ready to go on again. I can see no harm in going inside and getting out of the wind and cold. I open the door. The room smells of dust, camphor oil and books. The stove in the center of the room still holds a little warmth, so I plunk myself in the desk closest to it, lay my head in my arms and close my eyes to catch my breath.
I must have fallen asleep because when I next open my eyes, I am greeted by the first grays of an early morning winter sky. The squeal of a door hinge echoes in my brain, and I realize this must have been what woke me. Footsteps sound in the mudroom.
“What’s this, then? Do I spy a boy so anxious to get to school he sleeps in the schoolhouse so as not to be late?”
I sit up. A man of about sixty fills most of the doorway. His quiet blue eyes flicker in a face that, even after the long winter, is sunburned from decades spent outside. After saying this, he walks into the room and reaches for the wood bucket next to the stove. “Be another hour or so before anyone else turns up.”
I nod, but I remain in the desk, where I am still trying to get my bearings.
He looks closer at me and frowns. “But I don’t believe you go to this here Fishburne School. What’s your name, son?”
“John…” I try to think quick for a second name. I catch a glimpse of a name written on the chalkboard at the front of the room. “Laurier, sir.”
“John Laurier. Last name same as our prime minister’s. That’s a right French-sounding name for a Home boy, which I detect in your voice. Well, John Laurier, I’m Hector Barnes and I take care of this here little schoolhouse. I don’t recognize you as being from around here. Where do you come from, and where are you on your way to?”
I stand up, shuffling some to give me a few more seconds to think. It’s an awful strain to have to do so much quick thinking when I’m feeling so dead on my feet. “I just left the home where I was living for the last few years. I’m of age and done there now. I’m headed out to the West Coast to find work.”
Mr. Barnes nods, but he is again looking at me kind of quizzically. I’m sure he is wondering why I am so wispy if I’m of age. “Got something lined up there, have you?”
I shake my head that I don’t. Mr. Barnes continues to study me. I can see he is trying to make out what sort of boy is standing in front of him.
“Those are some fine overalls you’re clothed in. You must have come from a prosperous home. Decked you all out before you left, did they?”
“Yes,” I say, suddenly uncomfortable in Tom’s too-big overalls, “they did.”
Mr. Barnes nods. “Most kind of them, I think. And you must be grateful for all they done for you. I mean, caring for you, employing you in something useful, then sending you off into the world looking your best.”
“Yes, sir. I was treated most kindly and I am appreciative of all they did for me.”
“Have you had any breakfast, John?”
“No, sir.”
“I’ll tell you what. I’ve got some pork pie Mrs. Barnes just baked up yesterday and some good coffee. If you want to pitch in, I’ll gladly share my grub. You can start by taking this bucket here and filling it from the woodpile out back.”
I do what Mr. Barnes asks. And while I do it, Mr. Barnes sets himself down at the teacher’s desk, smokes his pipe and watches me. I fill the wood bucket, get the stove stoked and a blazing fire going. I retrieve a pail of water from the well, fill the washbasin and fetch another pail of water to have on hand. Mr. Barnes then sends me to scrub the privies, which I do until they are plenty clean.
When I’ve done that, Mr. Barnes says that’s all I need to do. He knocks out his pipe. He then cuts two slabs from his big pie, and we enjoy it while sitting at the desks chatting about the old days when we both went to school. Mr. Barnes offers me a second piece. While I’m eating it, he sets to writing a letter. When he’s done, he seals it with a clump of wax from the teacher’s desk. He stands up. He tells me the teacher and students will be arriving shortly. I say I will be on my way.
“Have you got any money, John? I only ask because you polished off that pie like it’s been some time since you’ve had a meal. And you’ve got a mighty small pack there to contain many provisions.”
I shake my head that I don’t.
“That’s just about what I thought. I must admit, I had my doubts you could tote your skinny weight, particularly when I saw those coveralls so fine and new. But you worked hard for your breakfast, and you worked like you’re used to it. You also worked without a word of complaint. I don’t know the story behind those ill-fitting clothes, and I’m not about to ask. All I know is they don’t agree with all the rest. You’ve got those on, yet here you are sleeping in a schoolhouse, not in a proper bed. I’ll let you in on something, John—I’ve run into more than one Home boy coming to this school. They come for a couple of weeks or months, and then they disappear. I’ve seen how they’re treated by those who call themselves employers—it’s shameful is what it is. That’s why I’m inclined to give you the benefit of the doubt. Anyway, I’m going to recommend you to my sister. Mrs. Mabel Millard is a kindly soul and she runs a fine stopping house about twenty miles west of here. When you get there, you tell her Hector Barnes says you’re a good worker and could she hire you for a few days to get you on your way. Her husband’s working on the railroad and she’ll appreciate the help.” Mr. Barnes hands me the letter. “And if you will, pass on my warmest regards.”
I tell him that I will gladly pass on his regards and that I am most grateful for his kindness. I keep my mouth shut about the coveralls, not wanting to go into the whole blessed story. Tucking the letter in my rucksack, I set out again.