Wagon Train Sweetheart. Lacy Williams

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      Would they exile him from the caravan? He could live off the land, trapping and hunting the way he’d done for years. But he’d hoped for more. The small amount Mr. Bingham was to pay him for pushing the oxen to their destination was to be socked away so Nathan could purchase land.

      Or would they deem that his misdeeds were enough to hang him? He’d heard of it happening in other situations. The thought sent a shudder through him.

      Someone else was talking but a peculiar buzzing sound blocked the words and his light-headedness got worse. His stomach pitched from the dizziness.

      Everything around him began to darken—but that wasn’t right, was it? It was morning, it should be getting lighter as the daylight brightened.

      Then he blacked out.

      * * *

      The men had fallen into low-voiced squabbling and, at first, Emma Hewitt was the only one who witnessed Nathan Reed slump to the ground.

      And when the men noticed, they went silent.

      No one rushed to help him.

      “Really,” she huffed quietly. Emma did not like being the center of attention, but did the men have a shred of decency in them?

      They couldn’t seem to come to agreement on anything. After she’d discovered the missing hair combs yesterday, her brother had filled her in on the ongoing investigation. She’d heard talk among the other travelers; whispers of a thief among them, but the bite of violation remained this morning.

      Someone had rifled through her things.

      But that didn’t matter right at this moment.

      She picked up her skirt, intending to go to the fallen man, when her brother Ben touched her arm to stop her.

      “Wait. He might be faking. Pretending to swoon so if someone gets close he attacks or takes them hostage.”

      The alarming white pallor of Nathan Reed’s face indicated otherwise.

      “He’s not playacting,” Emma insisted, tearing her arm away from her brother’s grasp.

      She went to the prone man, meeting Mr. Stillwell, her brother’s friend, at his shoulder. Ben followed a few paces behind.

      Mr. Stillwell squatted as she knelt at Mr. Reed’s side. Stillwell touched his forehead. “He’s burning up.”

      But he didn’t look as if he intended to do anything about it.

      She shook Mr. Reed’s shoulder. “Wake up,” she whispered.

      She moved to touch his face, then faltered. If the great, burly, bear of a man was one of the children, she wouldn’t have hesitated to examine him as necessary, even if it seemed far too intimate with a grown man.

      She would think of him as a little child. She must. Even though he was the furthest thing from it.

      Holding her breath, she peeled back one of his shapely lips. His thick beard abraded her knuckles.

      He might’ve fainted from the fever or lack of sleep or food, but the marks inside his mouth confirmed what she’d already guessed. The contagious disease that had plagued their caravan had claimed another victim.

      “It’s measles,” she murmured.

      Her brother crouched at her side, Ben’s presence reassuring. “You sure?”

      She was. “Some of the children had the same white spots on their gums. See there?”

      Ben’s nose wrinkled and he only glanced cursorily into Mr. Reed’s mouth.

      “What do we do now?” Stillwell demanded.

      Before she could think to prevent it, he raised his hand and slapped Mr. Reed’s cheek. His dark head knocked to one side.

      Emma gasped.

      She could not abide injustice. In any form.

      “Don’t touch him like that again,” she commanded.

      But maybe Stillwell hadn’t heard her. His eyes passed over her almost as if she wasn’t there at all.

      Stillwell stood, directing his words to the other men. “He’s a thief—”

      It was easier for Emma to direct her words to the unconscious man on the ground. “Whether or not he’s a criminal, he’s still a human being and deserves basic kindness. And care.”

      She looked up and met Ben’s gaze. The men stood behind him, none paying attention. She’d spoken so softly that likely many of them hadn’t heard her.

      That was normal. Her opinions were rarely heard. And for a long time, it hadn’t mattered to her. It did now.

      But when Ben spoke, people listened. And he spoke now. “Emma’s right. We can’t punish a man in this condition. We’ll stay the verdict until he’s on his feet again.”

      The group of men grumbled. “What’re we going to do with him?”

      “We should just leave him behind,” Mr. Stillwell said.

      “You can’t,” she cried. “How would he survive?”

      But perhaps her distressed cry had only been loud in her own mind. Because again Mr. Stillwell did not pay her any heed, only turned his back to talk to the other men.

      Nathan Reed moaned, a low, pained sound that seemed as if it came from the depths of his soul, instead of from suffering a simple fever. He did not return to consciousness, and that worried Emma the most.

      “He needs care,” Emma insisted.

      Ben nodded to her. He’d heard, at least. He argued with the men and left her with the prone Mr. Reed.

      Emma was not a nurse. She’d had no formal training, only the difficult duty of being constantly at her father’s bedside those final years.

      Yet she was an expert at completing tasks that no one else wanted to do. At being available when there was no one else.

      And since she’d nursed many of the children in the wagon train when they’d been afflicted with measles, it did not surprise her when the men agreed to leave Mr. Reed under Ben’s care and delay his sentence until the time that he awoke. Ben would be busy driving the family wagon and carrying out his duties as a committeeman, so caring for Mr. Reed would fall to her. Ben did not ask for her agreement. He assumed she would consent.

      It was unsurprising, but a bit disappointing. Of course she would have agreed to help Mr. Reed. But the fact that she hadn’t been consulted rankled, just the tiniest bit.

      Maybe it was because, as one of the committeemen, Ben needed to make a quick decision so the wagon train could move out for the day, under the guide Sam Weston’s direction.

      Or maybe it was because her siblings had come to rely on her without СКАЧАТЬ