Chapter Five

He tensed at the sudden realization that he didn’t know where he was or how he had gotten there.  All he knew was that he felt like someone was holding a red-hot poker to his armpit and at the same time they were squeezing his head in a vise.  He was standing, but he didn’t understand how.  He couldn’t feel his legs.  But when the shout came to walk, his feet moved like they had a mind of their own with a single imperative to go forward no matter what.

When he stopped moving he found himself in front of a black wall glistening in a light he couldn’t see other than its eerie reflection on the wall.  He turned to the left and met another wall, just like the first, and turning all the way around he found himself surrounded by four black walls.  Below his feet was the same glistening blackness and above him, the same glistening blackness, and panic quickly took over.  He was trapped in a chamber of blackness.  A voice from somewhere in the distance yelled, “Dig!”, and when he didn’t, the walls moved inward…just a bit, but they moved.  The voice yelled again, “Dig!”, and when the walls moved again, he dug his fingers into the blackness and kept digging until he looked at his fingers, seeing only bloody points of bone.  He screamed, but there was no sound.  No one could hear him.  No one would ever hear him again inside the blackness.

Joe jerked, sending searing pain through his head.  Opening his eyes, he wondered for a moment if he was still in the black box, but then his eyes focused.  It was dark, but he could see stars above him.  He looked up at his fingers, and breathed a sigh of relief at the sight of flesh and fingernails. A nightmare…when was the last time he’d had a nightmare?  He didn’t usually remember his nightmares more than a few minutes after he woke, but this one was branded in his consciousness.  The word hopeless echoed in his mind, but he shook his head as if to scatter the word.  He wasn’t ready to have that look in his eyes that he had seen in the other four men.  Adam and Hoss…they’ll send for Pa, and they’ll all come looking.  They’ll follow the tracks. All I have to do is hang on until they get here.

He adjusted legs that were sleeping more soundly than the rest of him.  His head hurt, his face ached and his armpit was on fire.  Taking a deep shuddering breath, he closed his eyes, hoping sleep would occupy him until it was time to face his captors again.  The sound of a deep, rhythmic snore from somewhere close by found him in drowsiness and took him home to his room next to Hoss where all was well as long as he could hear that snore.

***

Nolan went down the line of feet at the side of the wagon, kicking them.  “Stand up you bunch of no count moles.”  He walked down the line as each man slowly got to his feet, and standing in front of Joe, he grabbed Joe’s chin and tilted his head to get a better look at his handiwork.  “I’ll tell you what, boy.  I’ll give these other boys a break today.  If you open your mouth today, I’ll even your face out for you.”  He laughed as he looked back over his shoulder to see if any of his men were watching.  “Wha’ d’you think?  He looks a little lopsided, don’t he?”  Shoving Joe’s face away, he turned and laughed with his men, then addressed the man whose tongue he had cut out, and said, “You got something to say about it?” sending his men into another round of laughter.  “Scully, water ‘em and feed ‘em, then get ‘em in the back of the wagon.”

“You don’t want ‘em to walk today?  I’d kinda like to see that young fella’s neck stretch just a little.”

“No, Scully, not today.  Maybe tomorrow.  Then we can drag him over the scrub in the desert.   We need to make Aurora today, so I can contact the fort and let ‘em know to send an escort.  Now get ‘em fed and in the wagon.  We need to move.”

Another name…Scully…the short fellow with the long blonde hair.

The stop tonight would be near Aurora, and Aurora would have a telegraph office and most likely a sheriff.

Joe leaned on the jockey box on the side of the wagon.  There were only two men on this side of the wagon at the moment, and they were busy saddling their horses.  He turned and laid his head down on his arms on the top of the box.  Glancing back once more, he slipped his hand under the cover, feeling for anything that might be useful.  He found what felt like a short rod and a longer rod, then looking back over his shoulder one more time, he pulled them out of the box and laid his head back down on his arms.

“Hey, what are you doin’?” yelled one of the men.

Just as the man grabbed Joe’s shoulder and spun him around, Joe slipped the rods underneath the canvas letting them fall inside the wagon at the same time he kicked the wagon wheel and knocked the box with his elbow to cover the sound of the rods landing.

His heart raced at the thought of what Nolan would do if he was found out, but he kept his voice even with just a touch of a slur.  “My head is killing me.  I was just laying my head down.”

The man unhooked Joe from the side of the wagon and moved him to the back. He handed Joe a cup of water, and when Joe was finished drinking, the man shoved a piece of dried meat and more stale bread into Joe’s hand, then ordered him in the wagon.  Before Joe sat in his place on the bench he glanced underneath, and seeing the two rods there, he smiled inwardly, then turned and sat quietly, eating his food.