Chapter 1

Hetty stood on the porch of the lodge-house, gazing out at the vivid hues of morning. To the east, the rising sun was already well up over Bridger’s Pass. The air was crisp, and the stolid sandstone-and-sod construction of the station hadn’t yet begun to heat. But high up in the sky, not a cloud was visible. Soon enough it was going to be a scorcher.

The sour smell of brimstone made her wrinkle her nose. That scent had permeated the atmosphere ever since they’d rolled into the courtyard the night before. No wonder they called this place Sulphur Springs.

Being raised on a farm, Hetty had been up for hours. To scant purpose, admittedly, since the Sweetwater run wasn’t scheduled to leave until six. The girl knew it was a kind of pridefulness to wax impatient over things outside one’s control. Even so, she was fidgeting, eager to get started on the final leg of her continental journey.

In the broader scheme of things, of course, the delay was only a trifle. She’d already been trundling along day-and-night on the Overland stage for the better part of a week, so another few hours hardly mattered. And given that she’d spent most of that week sore, dirty, and uncomfortable, the mandated stopover at Sulphur Springs was properly a blessing.

The stationmaster’s wife was a respectable matron, dedicated to the welfare of her guests. Hetty had wallowed in a real straw bed with clean cotton sheets, and woken to a hearty breakfast of eggs and potatoes. After that, Mrs. Dugan had arranged an unheard-of luxury: a hot bath! “Well, deary,” she’d fussed, “you’ll be seeing your man again this evening, won’t you? And after long absence too. So you’ll be wanting to put your best boot forward.”

It had been wonderful to soak off the grime, loosen her aching muscles, and treat herself to a clean outfit from her trunk. Hetty did worry that some cad might take the opportunity to peek in through a gap in the stones while she was changing, but the chinks seemed well sealed, so she tried not to fret.

Anyway (Hetty mused), it was just as well that she keep her guard up. The west was full of shady, sharp-edged men—and although she was close to her destination now, she wouldn’t have Johnny there to shield her till she’d accomplished this last sprint to the Sweetwater River. Then maybe she could relax a little.

Funny to say, but back in Cuyler, when Hetty had first been pondering Johnny’s proposal, the human perils of making this sort of trip alone hadn’t entirely registered with her. For twenty-two years on this mortal coil, she’d been accustomed to keeping her own self under tight control, while navigating the type of orderly society where she could predict and manage the reactions of others. She’d gotten used to dealing in clockwork certainties (at least to the extent that Providence grants such certainties to anybody). So when Johnny laid out his scheme—that after they wed, he’d stake a homestead out west, with her to follow later—it had left her with a whole mess of chaos to chew on.

Hetty was a bright girl, bright enough that she often found it prudent to shave down the edges of her wit and incision when dealing with others. And quite brainy enough to understand that if she went pioneering, she’d be giving up her life of safety to court the unknown. There were plenty of bogeys her mind could anticipate—fevers, blights, twisters, renegades—and she’d wrestled with them for weeks, late at night, before she finally decided to tell Johnny yes.

But it wasn’t until she was actually immersed in the journey, with the rude civility of Chicago at her back, that she’d started to grasp the slipshod morality of the western territories. Most of the men she met (and they were practically all men) appeared decent enough. But even her sheltered eye could spot the thick dusting of thieves, grifters, and bullies scattered among them. Their leers, gropes, insinuations were like nothing she could have imagined. Back in bucolic New York, blackguards like that would have been tarred and feathered. Here, they seemed to thrive. She’d be awfully glad when she had Johnny by her side to ward them off.

Someplace far out in the trackless sage, Dapper George was awake too. He hummed ‘Charlotte the Harlot’ as he oiled his six-shooter. It was going to be a big day.

Tomo had been up since well before dawn, and snared them a couple of jackrabbits. The latter were fixing to be breakfast now, stewing in a frypan with some onions and lard. Good man that Tomo.

As for Yuma Joe, he’d gotten pretty mauled with cyclone juice the night before, and wasn’t showing any sign of shifting from his bedroll. George plucked a pebble and chucked it at the man’s pate. “C’mon you flea-trap poke, up and at ‘em.”

Yuma merely drew the cover over his head and groaned. “Shhhiiiit, ain’t hours till that damn stage comes through. If you got any lick of sense, you’ll leave me be.”

George laughed and shrugged. Yuma had a point—no sense getting jangled up before it was time. But as for himself, he couldn’t help being excited. He had high hopes for this venture.

‘Course, there weren’t never no certainties when it came to waylaying a stage. Fate had a way of rooking even experienced road agents out of their rightful due. Still, George felt something good was coming their way today. The Sweetwater coach was supposed to be carrying a pretty fair haul—maybe the kind of score that could set them up proper—and he couldn’t wait to lay eyes on it.

Idly, he contemplated how he should spend his share of the loot. A little ranch tucked away at the back of nowhere? A goldrush store selling overpriced doings to prospectors? Some pink-tile hacienda down south of the border?

Then George snorted. Nah, he’d do what he always did—blow the whole damn wad on booze, painted ladies, and bad poker hands.

As any self-respecting man will tell you, you gotta be who you are.

At last, the mail they were waiting on came in, and the station hands began readying the coach for departure.

The wrangler leading the horses up to be hitched was a colored boy of about 30 or so. Hetty had noticed he was employed at Sulphur Springs when she’d rolled in the prior evening. Now, her eyes narrowed as they traced his path to and from the stables. Why (she wondered) would Mr. Dugan want to hire-on someone of that ilk?

Not that she held any truck with slavery. Hetty came from a line of God-fearing Free Soil Whigs. They’d backed the Union during the war, and greeted emancipation with uplifted arms.

Still, once the conflict was over, and a trickle of colored folk had started drifting into their hamlet looking for opportunities, that part hadn’t set so easy. The general sentiment in Cuyler was that if the Blacks had any sense, they’d use their newfound freedom to go back to Africa—or to Haiti, or really anywhere else—because they didn’t much fit in America. She prayed earnestly that the Lord would favor them with such good sense before very much longer.

A shout jolted her from her reverie. It was Mr. McLean, their driver. She’d had a chance to meet him at the breakfast table this morning. Evidently, it must be time to get aboard.

Hetty checked that her cases were stowed, then climbed into the compartment. On the Overland route, she’d been jammed into a large coach with any number of sojourners. But the Sweetwater run was a sleepy sideroad, and the vehicle was much smaller. Besides the two crewmen perched on the driver’s seat, she’d be sharing the cabin with only a single solitary traveling companion—quite the indulgence.

She hadn’t properly made this fellow’s acquaintance yet. He’d sat apart at the morning meal, poring over some past-date Laramie tabloid he’d scrounged instead of engaging in civil conversation. He was a diminutive fellow, a good deal shorter than Hetty herself in fact, but nattily dressed in a crisp bowler and city-style frock coat, and clutching a satchel full of important-looking papers.

Back home, Hetty would have been well-disposed to such a gentleman. Her pa, though only a farmer, was a relatively prosperous one, and a solid citizen. He maintained cordial enough relations with the business-types in town. But on her journey out west, the girl’s views on such things had altered somewhat. Of all the classes of folk out here, the money-men seemed to have the most sharks swimming among them. Oh, they may have hidden their avarice better, affecting a genteel manner; yet at the end of the day they were the ones sweeping up all the lucre, while hard-working toilers were left with mere crumbs.