“Bonny!” I screamed. She and Elm were pacing and trumpeting frantically.
I rushed forth, panicking. The gate was on fire…I needed to get it opened. Timere busied himself drawing water from the well. I grabbed the tin wash tub to assist him. The fire quickly spread to the outhouse. Smoke choked my lungs, but I made trip after trip to the well.
After we doused the gate with water, Timere opened it. Elm came racing out, his eyes rolling into his head. Timere threw his hands into the air and crooned to the fearful gelding.
“Bonny’s still in there!” I cried. “I’ll get her.”
Timere reached for me. “Etta, don’t you dare! The fire is spreading back over the gate!”
I swerved around him. “I need to get Bonny! I hear her screaming!”
“Etta—”
I darted through the gate. It slammed shut behind me. Smoke choked my lungs and burned my eyes, and I coughed violently, my vision blurring. Bonny was pacing frantically, calling for Elm. It was the first time in my life I’d seen her act insensibly.
“Bonny! We have to get out of here!”
She ignored me.
I lunged forth and hauled myself onto her back, heeling her hard. “Take us out of here, Bonny.”
She raised her head high, ears pricked, nostrils distended. She whickered loudly.
“Bonny—we’ll both die if we don’t get out of here.”
I dug my heels into her sides. She twisted her neck around to look at me, the intelligence and wisdom returning to her dark eyes. She half-reared and galloped straight for the gate. My heart thudded in my chest. Flames slowly flickered across it.
Bonny’s stride steadied but never faltered. I clung to her mane. She gathered her haunches underneath her and pushed off with her hocks. We soared over the flaming gate. When Bonny’s front hooves hit the ground, I tumbled off of her. I lay in the dirt for a moment, gasping and coughing.
Timere stomped over and yanked me upward by the elbow. “Etta Alby—what in tarnation were you thinking? You could have died!”
“Timere—”
He pulled me close. I could hear his heart racing a million miles an hour—pounding faster than Bonny’s hooves when she galloped flat out.
“I can’t lose Bonny, Timere,” I said, my words muffled by his shirt.
“I can’t lose you Etta Alby.” He kissed the top of my head and rested his chin on it. “You’re a fool.”
“Yes, I know—and you can punish me for it later. But—” I struggled out of his grasp. “Timere, the fire…”
He pointed east. “It spread to the shack.”
I gasped. “All our money—”
“I saved the saddlebags.”
“What’ll we do now?”
“We wait for the wind to die down. Then the fire will, as well.”
I frowned. “Someone must have started the fire, Timere.”
He swiped a hand through his hair, which he had recently cut so that it was shoulder-length again. “I know.”
“Where are Bonny and Elm?”
“They’ll come back—or someone will catch them.”
The wind stopped, and gradually the fire died down. I stared at everything Timere and I had put together with our dreams and our own hands. The outhouse and corral were ashes. The shack was crumbling, but still standing. My garden was dust. Wisps of smoke faded into the sky.
“Everything is gone,” I said quietly. “Our home is destroyed.”
“Maybe this is for the better,” Timere said.
I gazed at him in shock. “What do you mean?”
“I’ve been keeping something from you.”
“What is it?”
He sighed. “I’ve been setting aside money ever since I began earning it. I’ve always wanted to own a ranch. I figured you’d be angry if you found out—especially when we were in debt to Mrs. Lane.”
“I’m not angry about that—but what are you saying?”
“I have enough to purchase a small piece of land. I want to leave Calico and start a ranch. Will you come with me?”
“Calico is my home now, Timere. There is much more of the world to see, but…” I considered his offer. “Every day has been a struggle to survive—but it’s still my home. It’s caused me to appreciate life—and the fact that I’m living and thriving.”
“What are you saying?”
I clutched at my hair. “I don’t even know. I want to go with you—but I feel as if I’d be leaving a piece of myself behind.”
“Perhaps when you leave a piece of yourself behind and travel somewhere new, you discover a new piece of yourself. Isn’t that what occurred when you escaped your Aunt Gertrude?”
“Yes…”
“So will you come? We can have horses, Etta. You can have as many horses as we can afford, and a pasture for Bonny to run in.”
“I don’t know, Timere. I have to dwell on it.”
He stared at me a long moment. “Etta, if you come, will you marry me when we find a place of our own?”
My heart caught in my throat. “Marry you?”
“Will you?”
My heart boiled with feelings I didn’t understand. “Timere, you can’t bewilder me with all this information all at once. I need time to think.”
His eyes shone with hurt, but all he said was, “Alright.”