Passage West



  Passage West

  by

  Ruth Ryan Langan

  Electronic Edition Copyright 2012 Ruth Ryan Langan

  Originally published in paperback, 1988.

  www.RyanLangan.com

  * * * * *

  * * * * *

  Titles

  by Ruth Ryan Langan

  Historical Romance Classics

  Now Available as EBooks:

  Heart’s Delight

  Paradise Falls

  Ashes of Dreams

  Duchess of Fifth Avenue

  Captive of Desire

  Passage West

  Nevada Nights

  September’s Dream

  The Heart’s Secrets

  Destiny’s Daughter

  Texas Heart

  Texas Hero

  Mistress of the Seas

  Deception

  Christmas Miracle

  Angel

  Exciting Highlander Series

  Now Available as EBooks:

  Highland Barbarian

  Highland Heather

  Highland Heart

  The Highlander

  Highland Heaven

  * * * * *

  Visit Ruth’s website for more information at

  www.RyanLangan.com

  * * * * *

  To the Ryan and Langan families.

  Adventurers, dreamers, tinkerers, and builders.

  Saints and sinners.

  Survivors.

  * * * * *

  Author’s Note

  After thoroughly researching the routes taken across country to California, through scholarly works as well as diaries and personal journals, I came to admire the courage of those who chose this perilous journey. What drove them? Ambition, greed, hunger, despair. And for some, a sense of adventure, an overwhelming desire to reach new horizons.

  What really opened up the West was a terrible war that divided a nation and drove men and women to seek a better future.

  I grew to love the Market women, and the men who enriched their lives. And when their story finally ended, I was sorry. We had traveled a long road together, and it had become a wonderful adventure. I hope their story touches you in a special way.

  Chapter One

  Independence, Missouri—1865

  The setting sun had long ago bled into the foothills of the Ozarks. Riding through the muddy streets, he saw them: the drifters, the displaced families, uprooted from their farms and plantations, looking toward the west for another chance, a brighter future. Some looked ravaged, numb with shock from the War Between the States. Others appeared grief-stricken. Still others were angry, striking out blindly at anyone, anything. Almost all of them looked tired.

  The saddle-weary man pushed through the swinging doors of the saloon. He paused a moment just inside to allow his gaze to travel slowly over the occupants. No one seemed to take any notice of the tall stranger. His boots were caked with red clay and his shirt bore the sweat of more than thirty miles under a relentless sun. Satisfied that he knew no one, he moved to a corner table and sat with his back to the wall. When the serving girl appeared, he ordered a bottle of whiskey and a plate of stew.

  While he ate he watched the participants of a poker game, seeing their greedy eyes shift to the pile of chips in the middle of the table. To the left of the dealer a man with a patch over one eye kept stroking the gun at his waist.

  “Evening, stranger. Want some company?” The saloon girl sidled over and offered to ease the newcomer’s loneliness.

  For a moment she nearly distracted him. Then he saw the man’s hand grasp the gun butt, saw the flash of light reflecting off silver, and he reacted without thought.

  Before the one-eyed man could fire, the gun was shot from his hand. He twisted to face the one who had foiled his plans, his face contorted in pain and rage. His single eye blinked furiously.

  Someone from across the room flashed a deputy badge and hauled the wounded gambler from the saloon. The others at the table hurriedly pocketed their winnings and edged toward the bar.

  One man, leaning heavily on a cane, limped over and paused beside the corner table. Already, he noted, the gun had been returned to its holster. The man who had fired it went on calmly eating his meal.

  “Quick thinking.” The voice was strong, with a slight Scottish burr. “I like that in a man. Got a job?”

  The gunman paused in his eating, shook his head, and set down his fork.

  “Got a wagon train ready to head out to California. Could use a good man.”

  “Doing what?” The voice was a low growl.

  “What you just did here. Keeping trouble away from my train.”

  The man seated at the table continued looking at him without speaking.

  The one with the cane shrugged. “If you’re interested, come see me tomorrow noon. Behind Tremaine’s Stable.” Without another word, he hobbled away.

  Behind him, the younger man watched until the swinging doors blocked his view, then picked up his fork and finished his meal. That done, he drained the bottle of whiskey.

  * * * * *

  The rider approaching the wagon train was young—no more than his mid-twenties. But his eyes were world-weary. Shaggy black hair in need of a trim and a day’s stubble added to his craggy appearance.

  As he dismounted, half a dozen pairs of eyes watched him. He had a way of moving, quick, catlike. And a way of looking a man in the eye, studying, taking his measure. He said little, but when he spoke, the others listened.

  “Name’s Rourke.” He shook the dust from a battered Union cap before replacing it. His voice was low, with the tone of one accustomed to having his simplest order obeyed without question.

  “This is the fella I told you about,” the man with the cane explained to the others. “Welcome, Rourke. Name’s Stump. Mordecai Stump.” He offered his hand and felt it engulfed in a powerful grip. Nodding toward the men standing in a semicircle, he introduced them. “Brand’s my scout.”

  The scout was as thin as a sapling. His hair, coal black, hung below his shoulders. His eyes were a pale blue; his mouth soft like a woman’s. There was some Indian in him, Rourke figured. But not much.

  “Parker’s the cook. This is his first crossing,” Mordecai added.

  Rourke nodded toward the balding man whose stomach protruded so far over his belt, his feet had to be a mystery to him.

  “Thompson here is my right hand. An order from him is an order from me.”

  Rourke offered his hand to the tall, gray-haired man with the bearing of a general. Both Stump and Thompson wore buckskins tucked into tall boots.

  “Know how to use that thing?” Thompson asked, pointing to the gun at Rourke’s waist.

  “When I have to.”

  Not one to brag, Mordecai noted. He liked that in a man and smiled beneath his bristling mustache. He already knew Rourke could handle it just fine.

  “This is Reverend Coulter,” Mordecai said, indicating a hunched man, no more than thirty, with sad, hound-dog eyes. “Six families from his church here in St. Louis have decided to join us on the trek west.”

  “Reverend.” Rourke touched his hand to his cap.

  “And this is James Market. He and his family just joined us today. That makes eight wagons plus the chow wagon.”

  Rourke glanced at the square-jawed man who studied him with open curiosity. More than a little gray glinted in thick, sandy hair. His midsection had gone to paunch, but his arms rippled with muscles. His ruddy countenance was peppered with freckles.

  “Farmer?”

  James Market gave a curt nod. There was nothing friendly in his look.

  Rourke’s gaze scanned the circle of activity. “That all the wagons you’re taking? Eight?”

  “We have four more
joining us tonight. We should be on the trail by midmorning.”

  “Where’s his gear?” James Market asked, nodding toward Rourke.

  “He has all he needs right there.” Mordecai indicated the gun and gave a sly smile.

  “You don’t know anything about this Rourke.” Market was aware of cool gray eyes appraising him as he spoke. They were so cold, so calculating, he felt a shiver of fear along his spine despite the heat. “How can you trust our lives to a man whose only recommendation is that he reacted quickly in a saloon brawl?”

  Stump cut the man off with a look. “There is one thing you’d better learn right now, Mr. Market. This is my wagon train. I make the rules. If you dinna’ like them, you’re free to leave. But if you decide to stay, I willna’ tolerate any challenge to my leadership. Do you understand?”

  The man’s face reddened beneath the freckles. Without another word, he turned and stormed away.

  Mordecai watched him with a frown before he returned to the business at hand. “Pay’s no better than the army. Twenty dollars a month and all you can eat.”

  Rourke nodded, apparently satisfied.

  Watery blue eyes crinkled into a smile. “Welcome, Rourke. Anytime you get tired of sleeping under the stars, you’re free to sleep in the cook wagon.”

  The newly hired gunman swung into the saddle. “I’ll be here in the morning.” Wheeling his mount, he headed back toward the saloon.

  Behind him, Mordecai Stump watched in silence. There was something about Rourke. He was no hothead, but last night he’d used his gun instinctively. Yet he was slow to anger. When James Market had questioned his ability just now, Rourke hadn’t even said a word in his own defense.

  As Rourke’s horse crested the hill and disappeared from view, Mordecai’s eyes narrowed. He’d just hired a loner, who wouldn’t mix well with the people on the train. Probably a man with a past he’d just as soon keep secret. But that didn’t matter. What did matter was whether or not he would be around when trouble struck. Mordecai was a gambling man. He was betting Rourke would.

  Scowling, James Market returned to his wagon, still smarting from the dressing down he’d been given by the wagon master in front of the others. It grated to have to take orders from someone else. But, he reminded himself, it wouldn’t be for long. When he reached California, he’d be master of his own fate. He was sick and tired of life beating him down. He’d had enough of a land that took and never gave back. How many years had he hitched a mule and leaned his shoulder into a plow, only to encounter rocks and trees and barren soil? Barren. He thought of his wife, dead of childbirth, carrying his only son who was stillborn. And of the women who cluttered his life.

  His dreamy spinster sister, Violet, who lived in a world of pretty pictures and useless songs. She couldn’t even cook a man a decent meal.

  Carrie. His scowl deepened. A silly, frivolous girl who didn’t have a brain in her head. Fifteen, and still listening to her aunt’s fairy tales about pretty dresses with matching bonnets and tea in the afternoon.

  Then there was Abby. His hand curled into a fist at his side. At seventeen she could already work circles around the other two. Man’s work, mostly. She could sit a horse better’n most men. Inside of a day she’d learned to handle the new mule team and wagon. Her meals were fair; not as good as Margaret’s had been, but she kept them from starving. But she was ornery and obstinate, and getting harder to handle every day. He saw the look that came into her eyes whenever he confronted her. She tried to hide the anger that simmered just below the surface. She reminded him so much of.. . One of these days he’d have to take a whip to her. He pounded his fist into his palm. By God, if she challenged his authority, he’d do just that. He was the ordained head of his house. And none of them had better ever forget it.

  The object of his angry thoughts came into view as he rounded the side of the wagon. She was small and slender, no taller than a ten-year-old boy, with a tiny waist and narrow hips. Since they’d left the farm, she’d taken to wearing a pair of his pants. Her only good dress was saved for Sundays and special occasions. The buttons on her faded shirt strained across softly rounded breasts. She’d tucked her hair up under a wide-brimmed felt hat. Moist tendrils stuck to her forehead and the back of her neck. Stirring something in a pot over the fire, she lifted the wooden spoon, tasted, wrinkled her nose, then added water. It hissed and sizzled, sending up a spray of steam.

  “You burned it, didn’t you? That rabbit I caught this morning?”

  Her head jerked up at his angry accusation, then she turned away quickly. “It isn’t burned. Just a little tough. Needs to simmer longer.”

  “Then why didn’t you start it sooner? A man could starve waiting for his meals around here.” He picked up the jug, brought it to his lips, and drank deeply. When he corked the bottle, she could still smell the liquor on the breeze.

  “I was tending to the animals and helping Aunt Vi mend the lid on her chest.”

  “Damned chest,” he hissed. “She doesn’t need all those ribbons and lace. They’re just an extra burden.”

  Abby lowered her voice, hoping her aunt hadn’t heard. She couldn’t bear to see the older woman’s feelings hurt. “It doesn’t take up much room, Pa. And it makes Aunt Vi happy.”

  He caught her arm, twisting her to face him. “It’s obvious her love of those frills hasn’t rubbed off on you. Look at you. More boy than woman.”

  Plain. Abby had heard it all her life. Her mother had been a rare beauty, with hair the color of cornsilk and eyes bluer than a summer sky. Carrie had inherited Margaret’s hair and eyes. Even at the tender age of fifteen, her figure had already blossomed into lush curves.

  Aunt Vi was like a little China doll, with milky skin and pale, silvery hair. Her voice suited her, so soft it sounded almost like singing. Each day she insisted on wearing a clean gown and bonnet with matching ribbons. She’d never learned a woman’s chores, could barely cook and sew. But she was the most cheerful woman Abby had ever known. It would be impossible for Violet Market to say an unkind word about another. Her dreamy smile would brighten anyone’s day.

  Abby glanced down at her free hand, rough and callused from her labors. Self-consciously she ran it along the slim, boyish figure. She wished she hadn’t been born a girl. Life would have been so much simpler if she had been her father’s son. Angrily she touched a hand to her hat. She had inherited her father’s hair—thick, unruly, the color of carrots. Unbound, it would fall nearly to her waist. Her pale skin had been burned by the sun, despite her constant use of a hat. Her cheeks were tanned to a rich bronze. Thankfully, the Market freckles dotted only her shoulders.

  Her nostrils flared as she yanked her arm free. Rubbing the tender spot, she said softly, “I do the best I can, Pa.”

  “Starting tomorrow, you’ll have to do better. I’ll need to hunt our food and keep the wagon in repair. If you can’t handle the rest of it, you’ll just have to teach that lazy sister and useless aunt of yours how to help.”

  “They do help.” She stared at a spot on the ground to hide the anger she felt at his cruel words.

  He gave a snort of derision and pushed past her. “The two of them together couldn’t do the work of a two-year-old.”

  When he disappeared inside the wagon, she crouched beside the fire and listlessly stirred the contents of the pot. Carrie was young and scared. In the past month she’d lost her mama, her home, her whole world as she knew it. And Aunt Vi had always lived in a dreamy, happy place in her mind. She was more suited to a parlor, with an organ to play, and jam and tea for lunch. This trek across the west would probably kill her.

  Hearing her father’s angry voice from inside the wagon, Abby stood wearily. Her aunt and sister counted on her to stand up to James Market whenever his temper rose. As she had so often, Abby wondered just how strong she really was. She hoped she’d never have to be tested.

  Chapter Two

  Just before dawn ghostly ribbons of mist hovered between ground and trees, silveri
ng the leaves of a clump of poplars. Lanterns bobbed inside wagons as families rolled from their blankets and prepared for the first day of a journey that would take them across the plains, over the Rocky Mountains, and into the untamed west. In the cool morning air, horses blew and sidestepped in their anticipation. Harnesses jingled as men murmured and swore and hitched teams of mules and oxen. Inside the wagons, babies cried, and children giggled, while women scurried about making certain everything was secure.

  While they worked, the men argued good-naturedly.

  “Oxen make the best team for this kind of journey.”

  “Mules,” another called, hitching the obstinate beasts.

  “Oxen. Three to five years old. They’re compact. Not too heavy.”

  “Mules are faster. And if your wagon falls apart, you can pack out on a mule. I’d like to see you try that with an ox.”

  “If my family is starving, I can eat my oxen.”

  “Believe me. If I’m starving, I’ll even eat a mule.”

  The arguments were never-ending.

  Just outside the circle of light Rourke sat astride his horse watching the flurry of preparations. He felt oddly distanced from these people. This was their train, the business of crossing this vast land theirs. Whatever problems they encountered were their own. The pain and suffering they had yet to endure were no business of his. He had pain enough of his own.

  His gaze slowly encompassed the circle of light. The other four wagons had arrived just after dark, bringing the total to twelve as Mordecai had promised.

  At the sound of a whip cracking, Rourke turned toward a wagon to his left. He recognized the stocky man. The Market wagon. A mule kicked frantically.

  “Goddammit, hold him still or I’ll turn this whip on you.” James Market’s angry voice lifted above the morning sounds.

  Rourke watched the small, slender figure struggle with the nervous team while James Market untangled the harness and approached the first mule. It backed away from him and the man swore again.

  “So help me, this is your last chance. Hold that animal still until I get him in the harness.”