Vanguards of the Plains | Page 9

as she slid from the counter and ran toward me.
"It's a bad job," Jondo declared. "Just when we want to get off, too."
"Can't I go with you to Santa Fé, Uncle Esmond?" I wailed.
"Yes, Gail, we'll fix you up all right," my uncle said, but his face was
grave as he examined my ankle.
It was a bad job, much worse than any of us had thought at first. And as
they all gathered round me I suddenly noticed the same Mexican
standing in the doorway, and I heard some one, I think it was Uncle
Esmond, say:

"Jondo, you'd better take Gail over to the surgeon right away--" His
voice trailed off somewhere and all was blank nothingness to me. But
my last impression was that my uncle stayed behind with the strange
Mexican.
In the excitement everybody forgot that I had on neither hat nor coat as
they carried me through the raw wet air to the army surgeon's quarters
beyond the soldiers' barracks.
A chill and fever followed, and for a week there was only pain and
trouble for me. Nothing else hurt quite so deeply, however, as the fear
of being left behind when the Clarendens should start for Santa Fé. I
would ask no questions, and nobody mentioned the trip, for which
everything was preparing. I began at last to have a dread of being left in
the night, of wakening some morning to find only Mat and myself with
Aunty Boone in the little log house. Uncle Esmond had already been
away for three days, but nobody told me where he had gone, nor why
he went, nor when he would come back. It kept me awake at night, and
the loss of sleep made me nervous and feverish.
One afternoon about a week after my accident, when Beverly and Mat
were putting the room in order and chattering like a couple of squirrels,
Beverly said, carelessly:
"Gail, it's been a half a week since Uncle Esmond went down to our
other store in Independence, and we are going to start on our trip just as
soon as he gets back, unless he sends for me and Jondo."
I knew that he was trying to tell me that they meant to go without me,
for he hurried out with the last words. No boy wants to talk to a
disappointed boy, and I had to clinch my teeth hard to keep back the
tears.
"I want to get well quicker, Mat. I want to go to Santa Fé with
Beverly," I wailed, making a desperate effort to get out of bed.
"You cuddle right down there, Gail Clarenden, if you want to get well
at all. If you're real careful you'll be all right in a day or two. Let's wait
for Uncle Esmond to come home before we start any worries."
It was in her voice, girl or woman, that comforting note that could
always soothe me.
"Mat, won't you try to get them to let me go?" I pleaded.
She made no promises, but busied herself with getting my foot into its
place again, singing softly to herself all the while. Then she read me

stories from our few story-books till I fell asleep.
It was twilight when I wakened. Where I lay I could hear Esmond
Clarenden and Aunty Boone talking in the kitchen, and I listened
eagerly to all they said.
"But it's no place for a woman," my uncle was urging, gravely.
"I ain't a woman, I'm a cook. You want cooks if you eats. Mat ain't a
woman, she's a girl. But she's stronger 'n Beverly. If you can't leave
him, how can you leave her? An' Gail never get well if he's left here,
Cla'n'den, now he's got the goin' fever. Never! An' if you never got
back--"
"I don't believe he would get well, either." Then Uncle Esmond spoke
lower and I could not hear any more.
Pretty soon Mat and Beverly burst open the door and came dancing in
together, the sweet air of the warm April evening coming in with them,
and life grew rose-colored for me in a moment.
"We are all going to Santa Fé over the long trail. Every last gun of us.
Aunty Boone, and Mat, and you, and me, and Jondo, and Uncle
Esmond, rag-tag and bobtail. Whoop-ee-diddle-dee!" Beverly threw up
his cap, and, catching Mat by the arms, they whirled around the room
together.
"Who says so, Bev?" I asked, eagerly.
"Them as knows and bosses everything in this world. Jondo told me,
and he's just the boss's shadow. Now guess who," Beverly replied.
"It's all true, Gail," Mat assured me. "Esmond Clarenden is going to
Santa Fé in spite of 'war, pestilence, famine, and sword,' as