D orothy slept very little on Saturday night. She tossed and turned until she could bear it no more. Slipping from bed, she wrapped her mother’s shawl around her shoulders and knelt by the window.
The Superstitions stood tall and dark beneath the canopy of stars. A coyote howled in the distance and Dorothy could hear the nearby flapping of an owl’s wings, followed by his eerie hoot.
“Lord, what shall I do?” She kept her voice barely above a whisper. “I do not know how or where I could obtain any gold. Father is aware that I have none in my possession. I don’t know how Mr. Sinclair isn’t aware.”
She shivered at the breeze and pulled her shawl closer about her.
“I am frightened. I dread what Mr. Sinclair might do when I appear empty-handed on Saturday. I fear what his son might do in his father’s absence. I am frightened and I lack the wisdom to know how to proceed.”
The owl hooted again, and Dorothy rested her head against the windowsill.
“Father in Heaven, what am I to do?”
“But my God shall supply all your needs according to His riches in glory by Jesus Christ.”
The words of Scripture swept in on her memory, seemingly of their own accord. She raised her head and stared up at the stars.
“But my God shall supply all your needs…”
“Father in Heaven, I need to know what course of action I ought to take. Is that the meaning of the verse? That I’ll work out what to do?”
She sat for a while, listening to the wildlife and watching the stars. A few clouds shifted across the sky, obscuring the pinpoints of light.
“But my God shall supply all your needs according to His riches in glory by Jesus Christ.”
Dorothy’s eyes narrowed as she considered the verse again. “Thou wilt supply all my needs, so Thou wilt show me how to work out my troubles?”
She watched the stars for another few minutes but realized that her eyes had begun to drift closed. She didn’t want to fall asleep at the window.
“Lord, I need Thy help. I’m pleading. I know not what to do. Grant me wisdom, I pray Thee.”
Dorothy slept after that, though she woke up still weary. Her walk to church felt long, and she struggled to stay awake during the sermon.
She had nearly reached the path that led toward the foot of the Superstition Mountains, and therefore, home, when a dark and somewhat hunched figure stepped from behind a cactus. She jumped and slowed her steps, her hand straying toward her belt.
“Miss Dorothy Hodges, I think?” The man grinned, his long face straining in the effort.
Dorothy couldn’t decide whether to answer him. She looked him up and down in silence.
The man’s intense dark brown eyes gleamed beneath equally dark hair that hung in shaggy clumps around his head. The ends of his hair looked uneven and rough, as if they had been sawed off with little ceremony using a dull-edged knife. He wore no hat and his clothes hung rumpled and rather large, while on his feet he wore moccasins. Dorothy noticed the canteen slung over one shoulder but saw no weapon or anything else whatsoever.
She thought he probably had Apache blood. She’d seen other Indians around, and her father always seemed to know their tribe just by their faces. She didn’t have his ability, but she could recognize an Apache or a Navajo—occasionally, a Pima.
He waited for her inspection, still grinning, his face straining in such a way that made Dorothy certain that he did not smile often.
“I already know that you are Dorothy Hodges, so you don’t need to confirm my question.” His voice, very pleasant and rich, seemed out of place with the rest of the man.
“What do you want from me?” Dorothy’s hand still rested near her belt.
“Tsk, tsk, tsk. I’m not here to receive something so much as to offer you a little assistance.”
Dorothy’s eyes widened. She wondered though that she felt so little fear. “What manner of assistance?”
The man grinned again. “I overheard your predicament yesterday.”
Overheard my predicament? How would he? When?
“You find yourself in quite the cacti heap, young lady.”
Dorothy frowned at the last two words. The man in front of her couldn’t have been more than ten years older than she. She decided that she had better speak.
“What do you know of it?”
“I know that you are pledged to pay the worst money shark in Arizona a pile of gold. Knowing, as I do, who you’re dealing with, it’s probably a small mountain of gold really.”
“I don’t know.”
The strange man tilted his head and squinted his eyes for a second. He pulled his canteen into both hands. “What don’t you know, Miss Dorothy?”
Dorothy didn’t answer.
He tilted his head again. “Have you found gold to pay off your father’s debt?”
He seems to know an awful lot. Why should I talk to him, though? I don’t know him.
“I’m going to assume that your silence is an answer in the negative. I, on the other hand, have.” He grinned before taking a drink from his canteen.
“You have… what?” Dorothy didn’t understand the man any better than she understood where he got his information.
He raised his eyebrows in surprise beneath his shaggy mane. “I have found gold. Gold that would pay your father’s debt.”
A small snake slithered across the dirt at her feet and Dorothy glanced down as it rushed past, then back at the man before her. “Why would your gold pay off my father’s debt?”
“Because I would give it to you. Enough for payment, that is.”
Dorothy took an involuntary step back. “Why ever would you do that?”
“Because of the compassion in my heart, of course!” He bowed with a hand to his heart. He grinned again in his strained way. “There would be a price, certainly.”
Dorothy’s fear caught up with her situation and her heart began to pound much more urgently. She swallowed. “A price?”
“Nothing that you wouldn’t feel absolutely safe paying, I assure you.”
“I have nothing.” Dorothy heard her own voice falter. “My greatest possessions are old and worn books.”
The man shook his head. “No, no. It’s not something you currently have that I want. It’s something you can get.”
“Something… that I can get?”
“No, no, Miss Dorothy. I won’t tell you that until you are ready to agree. I can see you need time to think.” He took another drink from his canteen, then slung it behind him once more. “I assume you know Weaver’s Needle?”
Dorothy nodded. “It’s in the Superstition Mountains.”
“It’s a good hike, but I imagine that you could manage there and back within a day.”
Why would I want to?
“If you decide that my offer is one to seriously consider, come up to Weaver’s Needle on Friday. I would suggest making quite the early start, as it could be a couple of hours—three at most—before you start down again. I don’t imagine you want to camp up there alone with gold in your pack.”
Dorothy took a deep breath. “Why should I trust you? I don’t know you.”
The man grinned one more time. “Because you know that you can’t trust Charles Sinclair. I’m your only other choice.”