Helen swallowed hard and looked toward the doorway. Rafe should be back soon. A short time ago, he and Zeb had gone with the boy to his old house to pick up any personal belongings that were left. The ramshackle hovel had been taken over almost immediately by four miners, even before the jury’s verdict.
“What will happen to Hector now?”
“Well, I don’t rightly know.” Mary scratched her head. “He’s become real attached ta Zeb, fer some reason. Guess he kinda looks on ‘im as a gran’pappy. Zeb lost two sons and a daughter ta the cholera years ago, an’ he’s been so consarned lonely since his Effie died. Well, who knows! The good Lord do work in mysterious ways sometimes.”
“Perhaps Pablo will take Hector when he comes,” Helen offered. “After all, he is the boy’s uncle.”
“Mebbe,” Mary said dubiously.
Hector had been staying with Rafe and Helen and Zeb the last few days, all crowded into the one hotel room. She couldn’t exactly recall how Zeb and Hector had become part of their group. It just seemed to happen.
The boy hadn’t seen his mother die that morning, but he couldn’t help but be aware of what was happening. He never cried, and he rarely talked, although they’d learned that he spoke fluent English, having grown up in brothels patronized by mostly American men. His only show of emotion was the way he clung tenaciously to Zeb — his only anchor in this crazy world.
Helen’s gloomy thoughts were broken then as Rafe showed up, with Zeb and Hector following close behind. And Helen realized that, like Hector, Rafe wasn’t showing much emotion, either, these days.
He’d become attached to the baby — Maria had been her name — and Helen knew that her death had affected him deeply. But he never wept or talked about it, not even when he’d dug her tiny grave on a rocky hillside outside town.
Immersing himself in Rosalinda’s case throughout the day, and dealing monte at night, had been his way of handling his grief. All to no avail. Rosalinda was dead, and their supply of money was virtually depleted.
She stood and walked over to him. Although he remained stiff and unresponsive, she wrapped her arms around his waist and hugged him tight. Only when he relaxed a bit and mumbled something about her cutting off his circulation did she let him loose. He smiled grimly at her attempt to comfort him and palmed her bottom, rubbing intimately.
“Ra-afe!”
“Just checking to see if it was still there.”
At least his humor was back, even if it was at her expense.
Mary chuckled and Hector giggled, the first sound of amusement she’d heard from him. Zeb added sagely, “A man should pinch his wife’s arse at least onct a day ta show ‘er who’s boss. That’s what my pappy allus said.”
Mary guffawed, leaning down to give Zeb a whack on the back.
The old man cringed. “Tarnation, girl, you got the boomiest voice in the whole valley. Even worse than that feller of yers… What’s his name? Hank?”
“Not Hank. Yank. And he’s not my feller.”
“Hah! He toilers you around like a randy bull. Givin’ you those yellow dime novels to get yer juices risin’. Yep, I’d say he’s yer feller all right. Jist waitin’ fer the right moment ta corner ya, he is.”
They all laughed then, forgetting for the moment the somber situation they were in.
That evening, very late, Helen sat up waiting for Rafe to finish his shift at the gambling hall. She tried to read one of Mary’s dime novels, The Maiden and the Knave, by lantern light, but was too distracted by her many worries.
Zeb and Hector slept soundly on the floor, wrapped in the extra blankets Rafe had brought from the house.
Helen needed to talk to Rafe about their future. So many things were happening to them so quickly. Maybe now he’d agree to go back to the landing site. But what about Pablo? And the parachutes? Exhaustion soon overtook her, and she decided to lie down, just for a minute.
It was already daylight when she awakened to a loud pounding on the door. The first thing she did was look to her left in the bed.