Gather The Children (Chronicles of the Maca Book 2) Read online

  MacDonald smiled. “Tis welcomed ye are then, in our hearts and our House. Now, let us go back.”

  Chapter 3: Introduction to Civilization

  The office was heat-hot from the extra bodies: everyone sitting or standing and waiting for more excitement. Franklin had half-hoped Rolfe would have taken his grown cub and leave, but, no, the Dutchman just stood there daring any to ask him to leave. Franklin, like most Americans, heard Deutsch as Dutch and rarely made the correct country connection.

  The boy came in first, face set and jaw tightened. MacDonald had evidently rough broke him. MacDonald nodded at Rolfe and the assembled audience, but he spoke directly to Franklin.

  “Are we in agreement that the laddie goes home with me, and I send the telegram to Mr. O'Neal, sparing the county the expense?”

  Franklin would have liked to reject MacDonald's offer. Reality, however, was the small jail he ran had no extra room, and since the South's capitulation, money for rations was nonexistent. If the present United States judge found out the gold taken in the robbery and death of O'Neal involved Confederate gold, the man might not consider it a crime at all.

  “All right, MacDonald, but if I find out that there is a valid warrant, I'll be out after him.”

  “Aye,” MacDonald nodded again. “Good day, gentlemen.”

  “Ah want my guns.” Stubbornness slashed through the voice as Lorenz protested.

  MacDonald looked at Franklin. “We'll take them with us.”

  Rolfe picked up the arsenal and moved towards the door. MacDonald clamped his hand down on the boy's shoulder, gently nudging him on his way. “Ye are nay to touch a weapon for a while.”

  Lorenz breathed deep and looked longingly at his guns and knives, then shrugged. Outside they paused for MacDonald to introduce the young man who had stood at the back. “Lorenz, this tis Young Rolfe. Martin tis his given name. Martin, this tis Lorenz, Anna's laddie.”

  Martin extended his hand, blue eyes beaming welcome and in a firm, baritone voice said, “Good to finally meet y'all, Lorenz.”

  Startled, Lorenz shook his hand. Martin appeared to be a couple years older than he, a blond, younger version of Rolfe without the mustache and teeth browned by chewing tobacco.

  “My poys und me vill get some eats.” Rolfe pointed to Young James up on the wagon seat. The wagon was a sturdy rectangle made of fading, once painted, green slabs of wood, and a solid unimaginative design. Rolfe stored the weapons in a locked box in the back of the wagon and he and Martin climbed aboard. “Meet du in front of Stanley's place.”

  “Aye, friend Rolfe. Lorenz, we go this way.” MacDonald waved toward the section of town where the freight station stood.

  “We're gonna walk?” Lorenz couldn't believe it. A cattleman walking instead of riding was not natural. He had seen a huge riding horse; one of the two horses tethered to the wagon, and figured it had to be MacDonald's. It was an animal big enough for him.

  “Aye, we twill come back for yere horse.”

  Lorenz fell in step rather than be dragged or propelled along. There was still no way out as there were far too many people, and why the hell was Martin glad to meet him?

  “Ah ain't neveh goin' to see that gold, am ah?”

  “Who kens? Mayhap in a few weeks.”

  “Huh, an' iffen it does come, who gets it, y'all?”

  “Nay, twill be yeres.”

  Lorenz didn't believe him, but didn't argue. They passed people hurrying to be done with their chores before the midday heat. Women would draw away and wrinkle their noses. Lorenz seemed oblivious to their behavior, but he knew they were afraid of him. Afraid, just like his ma would be when she saw him again. Why the hell was this big bastard taking him there? For Lorenz, it was enough to know that she was alive and safe. Then again, maybe she wasn't safe; not with this big bastard beating on her. Maybe he should swing by there once he got away.

  A huge blue star hung over the freighting office, proclaiming to one and all that this was the Blue Star line. The blue star identified the office as the town's reason for being. Men were constantly going in and out with orders to be filled, teams to be tended, harnesses repaired, the shifting, stacking, and re-routing of trade goods. This part of the country's network of merchandise distribution was as yet undisturbed by railroads. Freight was hauled in from every major point by wagons, mules, and men. The building housed the merchandise, wagons, loading docks, separate quarters for the teams and men, and in the office, the indispensable telegraph. Town women had agitated for the telegraph to be moved to a more genteel location, but economics kept the telegraph were it was needed.

  “Hallo, Mac,” said the man at the desk. He was long, lanky, dark haired, and mustached. Whatever animosity the town felt towards Yankees, this man didn't. Business was business. “Y'all planning to carry your goods home now?”

  “Nay now, but in a bit, Andrew, it tis your communications I'm needing this time.”

  “My what?”

  “The telegraph,” explained MacDonald. “I find it tis necessary to send two. Ye can get messages to Carson City, Nevada, aye?”

  “Sure thing. I heard y'all and Rolfe had brought in a herd. Prices any better for beef?”

  “Bah!” A deep rumble issued from the throat. “If we nay had the contract, they would have screwed us as badly as any that wore the grey. As tis the money twill buy beans. Andrew, this tis Lorenz. Lorenz, Mr. Andrew.”

  Andrew nodded at Lorenz and shoved a piece of paper to MacDonald. “Howdy, young man.”

  Lorenz nodded and watched MacDonald bend and scrawl lines across the sheet. He finished with a flourish and looked at Lorenz. “Does yere sister have an address?”

  Lorenz shook his head. “Then what about O'Neal? Does he have an address?”

  “He owns the Sportin' Palace, or did when ah left.”

  MacDonald sighed and shook his head. “Andrew, the first goes to Miss Margareatha Lawrence, General Delivery, the other to Mr. Red O'Neal, owner, Sporting Palace.”

  “I'll read them back just to make sure there's no error.” Andrew's face showed no emotion as he read. “Miss Margareatha Lawrence. Stop. Lorenz is safe with us. Stop. A letter from your mother, Mrs. Anna MacDonald, nee Schmidt will follow. Stop. Mother rescued eight years ago. Stop. Zebediah L. MacDonald

  “Next one,” continued Andrew. “Mr. Red O'Neal, Sporting Palace. Stop. Marshal Franklin of Arles, Texas needs your confirmation that Patrick O'Neal was alive when Lorenz left with you two years ago. Stop. Marshal has family poster. Stop. Speed is important. Stop. Zebediah L. etc.” Andrew looked at MacDonald.

  “Aye, twill do.”

  “That'll be five dollars for the two.”

  “Tis dear.” MacDonald dug down in his trousers and extracted a coin.

  “At least it gets there,” replied Andrew. “Y'all going to pick up everything for Schmidt's Corner?”

  “Nay, just the liquor barrels for friend Rolfe and myself. Twill be another hour or so ere we're back,” answered MacDonald and tipped his hat at Andrew. He and Lorenz stepped outside and walked back towards the Marshal's office.

  Lorenz was trying to devise an escape plan. Maybe he could race the man and jump on Dandy and be gone. He tensed. The crowd wasn't much and big man probably couldn't move too fast.

  “If ye are thinking of bolting, dinna. And when we are at the wagon, ye dinna touch yere mount.”

  “Why?”

  “Tis another of my rules.”

  Lorenz sulked. The man's rules were becoming tedious. This was just like being with his sister. And how the hell did he know what he had been planning?

  MacDonald untied the reins and led the way to the wagon now parked in front of the general store called Stanley's Dry Goods and Sundries. The wagon's faded green slabs were hung with water barrels and nose bags. The team of part Morgan and some other lineage stood with heads bowed and tails swishing at the gathering flies. MacDonald tied Dandy's reins to one of the hoops at the back and pulled down the tailgate revealing an i
nterior lined with boxes. “Now we'll have a look at yere stash. Ye can take off yere saddle and bags as they'll go in the wagon. Ye'll be riding with Martin on the seat.”

  “Like hell!”

  “Laddie, I am being patient. Take off that saddle,” MacDonald commanded.

  Lorenz stared at him. “Why cain't ah ride?”

  “Lorenz, if ye dinna wish yere britches down now in front of all of these people, ye twill do as I have said.” MacDonald's r was rolled into three in his pronunciation.

  Lorenz yanked at the cinches. Outright rebellion was futile. He would wait for a better time. He half-threw, half-slammed the saddle onto the wagon bed. MacDonald's eyes glinted, but he knew he had won.

  “Now, let's see what ye have.”

  The contents of the saddlebags were slim. There was no food and no tobacco. MacDonald held up a pair of canvass jeans and critically eyed the lad before him.

  Lorenz flushed. “Ah grew. Ah would have traded 'em, but no time.”

  “Tis this all the clothes that ye have?”

  “That's it.”

  MacDonald shook his head and extracted the remaining items: a thin blanket, a tin plate and a spoon. The implements he put into the chuck box and left the blanket in the saddle bags. Then he shoved the saddle against the sidewall.

  “Since all the clothes that ye have are on ye, we twill go shopping.”

  “Why?”

  “I canna take ye back to your mither with nay but those clothes.”

  Lorenz was puzzled, but then realized that his mother was going to have opinions about what he wore similar to Rity's ideas. MacDonald's voice rumbled on.

  “Walk.” He pointed to the doorway in front of them.

  “We ain't eatin'?” There was real regret in Lorenz's voice.

  “Aye, ere long.”

  The inside of the store offered relief from the sun's gathering strength, but there was no breeze and the air was beginning to resemble a modern sauna. The smells of pickles, brown earth still clinging to potatoes, coffee, spices, dyes from the few new clothes and polished boots assailed the nose. A slender, balding man of about forty nodded at them. Stanley would have preferred to ignore the huge man, but like the rest of the town, he knew that the damn Yankees had delivered a herd to the cavalry stationed outside the town. If necessary, Captain Richards would enforce the sale.

  The bile rose in Stanley at the thought of MacDonald and Rolfe, two of the few people with cash money in their pockets in June of 1865, walking around and not hung or tarred and feathered. The soothing proclamations of the provisional governor notwithstanding, the War had left the South bereft of valid currency. He knew that both men would buy most of their goods from MacDonald's brother-in-law at Schmidt's Corner. “Anything ah can do for y'all?” His offer was perfunctory, his voice cool and aloof.

  Amusement lurked in MacDonald's voice as he answered, “Aye, the laddie needs a pair of boots.” Inside, the big man was shaking with laughter as Stanley's eyes lit up. “Plus two pair of socks as the missus twill knit more.” No need to raise the man's expectations too high. “And a pair of britches,” he concluded.

  To Lorenz he asked, “Do ye have a slicker?”

  Lorenz shook his head. “Answer and say it right,” MacDonald's voice rumbled out at him.

  Lorenz quit gawking at the meager goods laid out on the table, flushed, threw a baleful glance at the big man and spat out, “No, suh.”

  “Mayhap that can wait. It does nay seem ready to rain for a while, but twill need a shirt.”

  “Will Mrs. MacDonald be needing any material for new shirts?” asked Stanley, a note of expectation crept into his voice.

  “Nay, she still has a bolt from her last shopping trip, howe'er, once we have selected a pair of boots and some clothes, twill need a few supplies for the extra mouth.” He turned toward the end wall and the rack of boots. They were all crudely made, and all the same color: black. The boots were made to fit either foot and so fit neither. MacDonald had his own boots cobbled as none such as these would fit him. He longed for the day when they could afford a tailor, and his wife would no longer need to make all of his clothes.

  Stanley, ever the salesman, selected two of the boots and handed them to MacDonald with a flourish. “Finest pair in town.”

  MacDonald held them alongside one of Lorenz's feet. It was impossible to tell if they would fit or not. Lorenz's current boots were slashed at the side to allow for feet that had outgrown the pair he wore.

  “Lorenz, take off yere boots and try these on.”

  He turned to Stanley. “Ye might as well give us a pair of those socks so that he twill have them on when we buy the boots. I dinna want the boots to fit without the socks.”

  Stanley raised his eyebrows. “Why not, is he still growing?” He was curious as to which of the lost children this one would be.

  “Nay doubt he twill. He tis but fifteen, and already he tis as tall as his mither.”

  Lorenz looked at his stepfather with a puzzled frown. No woman he'd ever seen was that tall except Rity. He took the socks from Stanley and slowly dragged them on while searching in his mind for some remembrance of his ma.

  He remembered her towering over him enraged, grey eyes flashing, her lips drawn in a tight line, “Nein, nein. Du must not!” He must have always had the ability to make people mad. He looked up to see MacDonald ruefully regarding the unclad foot. At least the big bastard didn't say anything about the toenails and dirt clinging everywhere and he hurriedly pulled on the other sock.

  After comparing the new boots with the old pair, MacDonald asked, “Have ye grown in the last few months?”

  Lorenz shrugged. “Some, ah reckon. My shirt got too small and had to…” He stopped short and began tugging vigorously on the new boot. No need to tell MacDonald that he'd taken the shirt from someone's clothes line. Instinct told him that MacDonald would want to pay somebody for it even if the price came out of his own hide.

  MacDonald watched the fight with the boot and said to Stanley, “We best see the next size.”

  This pair proved to be a tad wide, but the selection of sizes had ended. “Twill do,” sighed MacDonald. “Now we need a shirt and a pair of summer drawers and vest.”

  Lorenz was horrified. “Ah gotta put those on? Hell, it's hot out there.”

  “Ye need nay wear them right now.” The voice was patient, half amused at his distress.

  The shirt was blue, rough, and collarless. The cotton drawers and vest were bought a size too large to allow for any growing Lorenz might do. MacDonald added a couple of handkerchiefs, a belt, and then moved toward the counter.

  Stanley rapidly positioned himself in line with the counter and the shelves to be able to retrieve any item that was ordered. If the man bought enough, Stanley would be able to pay on his account at the Blue Star. Maybe he could even stay in business.

  On his way to the main counter, MacDonald picked up a doll with brown hair and a fixed smile. “And how much tis this,” he asked holding it aloft.

  The doll, like many items in his store, had lain there since the second year of the War. Stanley licked his lips. “Two dollars.”

  “One.” MacDonald's eyes hardened.

  Stanley nodded. “One dollar it is.” Damn the man. He always seemed to know what a body would accept in payment. At the counter, Stanley took out his pad to jot down the purchases.

  “We need a pad of paper, lined, and a pencil.” MacDonald was consulting a list. “And do ye happen to have some colored chalk for a wee lassie to do some drawing?”

  Stanley retrieved the items from their respective shelves. “Come fall, we'll have some of those nice wax crayons,” he volunteered.

  “Nay. Kap twill get them for us.” MacDonald could not resist shooting an arrow into the Stanley's pocket of hopes.

  “Now as to the food,” he continued. “Twill be needing an extra pound of beans.” He eyed Lorenz critically. “Mayhap ye best make that two pounds, two pounds of flour, and five pounds of pota
toes. Do ye have any canned tomatoes left?”

  “Not a one,” came Stanley's bitter reply. “There are a couple of cans of peaches left though.”

  “Aye, we'll take them. Do ye have any condensed milk? Twill go well with the peaches.”

  “Certainly,” Stanley's voice became brisk and businesslike and his movements quickened. As he brought the canned goods to the counter, he noticed the boy eyeing the loaves of bread and rolls. “Maybe he'd like a roll while we're conducting our transactions,” he suggested.

  MacDonald nodded glumly. He suspected a hollow stomach in that skinny body. “Aye, add it to the bill.” Lorenz snagged a roll and stuffed it into his mouth.

  “We are nay sure if the dried apples twill be on this shipment to Schmidt's Corner,” continued MacDonald. “Do ye have any?”

  “No, we're completely out, but here, try some of these. Brand new this year, just in from California.” He removed a saucer from the top of a cup and handed the cup to MacDonald. “I can't keep the flies out of them else,” he said to explain the saucer. “They're called raisins, dried grapes, and just as sweet as can be.” He didn't add that they were on consignment from growers in California desperate to get rid of two years' worth of agricultural products.

  MacDonald's huge fingers barely fit into the cup. He extracted a few of the raisins and warily rolled one on his tongue and bit down. Surprise flooded his face. “Tasty. Here, laddie, try some.” He dumped the remaining fruit onto the quickly outstretched hand. The raisins went the way of the roll.

  “How do ye use them?” he asked Stanley.

  “Just like any dried fruit; cakes, breads, and pies,” answered Stanley.

  “Then twill take a pound. Mrs. MacDonald twill be pleased. Now, do ye have any ladies' gloves?”

  Anger reddened Stanley's face. MacDonald knew he did not carry finery. Stanley also knew MacDonald would take his money down to the French seamstress. He considered the woman an insult to the town. A former prostitute, she did the sewing for the whorehouse floozies, and kept a supply of cheap doodads for their costumes, plus an assortment of ribbons and leather items that cut into Stanley's business. For some reason, the women from the saloons and brothels preferred her establishment. That MacDonald would even acknowledge his wife in public was another insult. Whoever heard of any other white woman living with the Comanche for two years and coming out in public places? Why couldn't she stay hid like a decent woman? “None,” he said as smoothly as possible.