Bittersweet

Three hundred yards from the barn, the horses broke into an uneven trot. In an instant the driver was on his feet, the lines curled through his hands, leaning back on the reins and shouting. Sarah dropped her paring knife and ran outdoors, a half-peeled potato clutched in her hand.

Matthew had left the stable and was playing down by the spring, the soft blue of his shirt barely visible above the weeds. Oblivious to everything, he poked twigs into the ground, making tepees for his growing encampment of Paiutes.

“Whoa, Goddamn you, whoa!” The driver’s voice rasped over the jangle of harness and the pounding hooves. The equipment was not made to race, and pinched the horses to bleeding. Already mad with thirst, the tearing of the furnishings drove them to frenzy, and dragging the overloaded wagon behind them, the wood groaning as if it would break, they turned for the spring.

Pale under sun-browned skin, the young man pulled on the lines with all his strength, attempting to turn the runaways. Boxes shook loose and several fell, bouncing end over end until the slats broke and machine parts scattered over the road.

“Matthew!” Sarah screamed. The dark head popped above the grass, followed immediately by the pointed hairy face of his constant companion. Matthew saw the onrushing horses and froze. The driver had fallen to one knee in front of the seat, the leads wrapped around his hands. He held on with dogged fury, fighting the six horses. Foam flecked the animals’ hides, the lather churning the dust to mud on their flanks, and flew from them like dirty snow.

“Matthew, run!” Sarah cried, and sprinted across the yard toward the spring, on a collision course with the oncoming horses. Quick as a cat, the boy scrambled under the railing and lit out for the barn, Moss Face close on his heels.

“Get back!” the driver yelled at Sarah as the horses cut between her and her son. In an impotent rage she hurled the potato. It struck the near horse above the eye, but the beast took no notice. Sarah fell back as the horses plunged through the railing she and Imogene had built. Two-by-fours splintered under the impact as the lead team, driven by the smell of water and the team behind, plunged into the spring. They were dragged down, thrashing in the traces, the water whipped white by lashing hooves. The screams of the animals mingled with the desperate cries of the driver as he tried to pull the four remaining horses to a stop. Thirst, the momentum of the overloaded wagon, and the pull of the animals already floundering in the spring combined to drag the next two horses over the bank. Wild-eyed, they lashed out with their hooves against the draw of the bottomless spring. The panicked blows fell on their fellows, and the water reddened with blood. Lost, the last horses fell to their knees and were pulled in. The wagon followed, the rear wheels gouging the grass from the bank. Buoyed up by trapped air, the wagon floated for a moment, poised on the roiling water, then the right rear corner started down. The driver struggled to his feet, untangled the leads from his hands, and threw himself as far from the sinking freighter as he could.

Sarah caught sight of Matthew, staring round-eyed from a safe perch on the paddock fence. “Rope!” she cried. He understood immediately and hit the ground ru

Pulled under by its own weight, the freighter looked as though the dark water were sucking it down. Within a minute it was submerged, but for the seat and the front wheels upended to the sky. Frantic, the horses fought its weight.

A rope draped around his neck like an ox yoke, Matthew ran to his mother’s side. She stood as near the edge of the spring as she dared, her eyes riveted on the floundering man. “Good boy,” she said. Lifting the coils from his neck, she wound one end of the rope a half-dozen times around one of the posts that had taken root and sprouted. “Here!” She handed the short end to her son. “Hold tight, don’t let it unwind!” So saying, she tossed the coil into the spring. The driver caught hold and began pulling himself to safety. As he grabbed at the reeds, a slashing hoof struck his temple and shoulder a glancing blow, and Sarah saw his hands relax on the life line.

The water curled in on itself like a wounded snake, and the wagon was gone from sight. Dark, silent shapes under the water, four horses struggled. Only the heads of the lead team, mouths squared with terror, breath coming in high-pitched screams, remained above the surface. Then they, too, were silenced and a vortex formed as the water was drawn down after them. The rope went slack and Sarah saw that the driver was sliding back into it.

She looped the rope once and slipped it over her head and down to girdle her waist. “Hold tight, Matthew, Momma’s going in.” She scrambled down the treacherous bank into the water, and shoved herself from the safety of the reeds to grab the drowning man by the hair. Together they went under. As the water was closing around her, Matthew cried, “Hold him, Momma! Hold him!”

With all her strength she kicked against her sodden skirts, kicked her tiny booted feet against the depths of the spring, her fingers twined in the young man’s hair. Her head broke clear of the water for an instant. His face shining, confident, and yet afraid, Matthew held his post by the cottonwood, gripping the rope with all his might. Sarah pulled herself and her burden toward that shining face. The reeds were around her and the bank against her shoulder, but still she held on to the rope, unable to pull herself free of the spring. The freight driver was clasped to her breast like a lover. She gasped for breath.

“Momma!” Matthew called.

“Don’t let go, honey!” Sarah said when she could find air. “Hold on tight.” The man in her arms was coming around. He threw his head back and fought to free himself. “Stop it!” she begged. Her fingers slipped on the rope, burning, and her chin slid below the water. He clawed, trying to drag himself out of the water over her. Desperate, she sunk her teeth into his shoulder. He roared with the sudden pain, and the panic cleared from his eyes.

“It’s okay, we’re safe,” Sarah reassured him. “Keep holding tight, hon,” she called up to the child. The man in her arms looked at her with unfocused eyes, blood tricking in a grisly wash from his temple. He was young, not yet twenty, with straight, tow-colored hair and pale blue eyes.

Tight in each other’s arms, hanging on to a rope held secure by a little boy, they regarded each other.

“I can’t pull us out,” Sarah apologized.

“I can boost you out, I think.” He grabbed the rope and, circling her waist with his free arm, lifted her partway out of the water. She crawled the rest of the way up the bank and turned to extend a hand to him. With her help he managed to pull free and they collapsed, gasping, in the grass.

“Coby Burns,” he managed, and coughed.

“Sarah Ebbitt. Pleased to meet you.”

“Can I let go the rope?” asked a small voice.

Sarah held her arms wide and Matthew ran from his post to tumble into them. “What a fellow you are. I love you so.” She kissed him until he laughed and squirmed. “You called me Momma.”

“Momma,” he said, suddenly shy.

“Coby Burns, this is my son, Matthew Ebbitt.”

Matthew shook hands with the older boy. “I’m sorry about your wagon, mister.” They looked at the spring; it was as smooth as glass, reflecting the deep blue of the sky. On the far side, a line of bubbles disturbed the surface, bursting into brown rings of mud-stained foam with a barely perceptible popping sound.

Coby Burns watched the water for a moment. “I sold everything my mother left me and went into debt to buy that outfit. I must be in the hole fifteen hundred dollars.”

“In the Round Hole,” Matthew amended.

Coby’s face crumpled and he looked as though he would cry. But he laughed, laughed until his fair skin turned beet red and his eyes disappeared behind his cheeks. It was infectious and Sarah began to giggle, then to laugh, until she was holding her sides and rolling on the grass.