The Lost Wagon Part 21

My name's Jake Favors."

Joe said, "I'm Joe Tower and I'm on my way to Oregon."

"And I have to get some mules gentled. Tell you what, if you can break me in a team of six, I'll give you ten dollars a head."

Joe grinned. "Have to get to Oregon."

"How much do you think it's worth?"

"Fifty dollars a head."

Jake Favors raised both hands in mock horror. "Man! I can't sell mules for fifty dollars a head!"

"You must be a mighty poor salesman."

"Tell you what. I'll lose money on it but I'll give you twenty five dollars a head for breaking in a team of six that will work together."

Joe hesitated. Certainly a hundred and fifty dollars more would be a G.o.dsend. It would a.s.sure them of enough money no matter what happened, but it took time to break mules properly. However, it would take less time if Joe could choose his own mules. He looked at the corral from which the gray had come.

"That your stock?"

"That's part of it."

"And I pick my own mules?"

"Any you want."

Joe said doubtfully, "I could wagon break six, but somebody else will have to polish 'em off."

Jake Favors looked narrowly at him. "What do you mean?"

"I'll break six to harness and teach them to pull together, gee, haw, stop, and back. It'll take more practice before they're really a fine team."

"Why can't you make 'em fine?"

Joe looked him straight in the eye. "I haven't got time."

"Do I pay you before you start or after you finish?" There was more than a trace of sarcasm in the question.

Joe said grimly, "After I finish. But I also want a clean place to camp and feed for my stock."

Jake Favors said, "You've made yourself a deal. Drive into the meadow behind the corrals and make camp. There's a good spring rising under the apple trees, and it's far enough from the corrals so you won't get much smell."

Joe swung his team off the road and onto the dusty, dry ground adjoining the corrals. A little way farther on the wagon wheels ground clean gra.s.s, and Emma looked nervously back at the city. Independence had its allure, but she had her children to think of and who knew what evil lurked in a place like this? She asked,

"How long do you think it will take you, Joe?"

"I'm going to try to make it in three weeks, but it might take longer."

"Isn't that cutting our time very short?"

"I doubt it. I figure that we can make thirty miles a day. We'll be in Laramie well before the fall storms. .h.i.t and we certainly need the money."

Emma moved uneasily and murmured, "Yes, we need it."

Because it was secluded and out of the city, she was less nervous when Joe swung the team into the grove of apple trees. There were eight of them that had had no attention, and as a consequence they bore knotty little apples that clung tightly to the branches with a few ripened ones on the ground. But the place was clean, and the spring that rose in the center of the trees and trickled itself into a reed-bordered rill, was cold.

Joe got down from the wagon seat and turned to help Emma. Leaping gracefully from the rear, Barbara turned to catch the younger children in her arms. Carlyle looked with intense interest at a red apple that had fallen from one of the trees and lay gleaming in the gra.s.s. Little Emma smoothed her dress and Joe looked soberly about. Alfred turned a disappointed glance on his parents.

"Is this Oregon?" he wanted to know.

Emma said, "It's a long ways to Oregon, Ally."

The youngster wandered down to the rill, and stooped swiftly to catch a green frog in his hands. He cupped it there, and the rest gathered around to marvel at this prize. Tad said impatiently,

"Let's make camp, Pa."

Joe warmed to his freckle-faced son, so unpredictable and wild one hour and so dependable the next. He reflected with a sense of gratification that Tad had been no trouble whatever on this trip. Maybe the trek was already beginning to take some of his wildness. Joe looked around at the camp site.

Since they were going to be here for some time, and not just overnight, they could have more comfort than overnight camps afforded. There were stones lying around and a good fireplace might be fashioned from them.

He said,

"How about gathering stones for a fireplace, Tad?"

"Sure."

The youngster went willingly to work, and after she had tied the cow securely, Barbara helped him.

Joe unhitched the mules and staked them. His eyes lighted on two chunks of wood that had been cut from a felled apple tree. He pointed them out to Emma.

"Suppose I borrow some boards from Jake Favors and lay them across those chunks? We'd have a pa.s.sable table. Plenty of wood around. Might make us some benches, too."

Her heart leaped at the thought of a real table again, but she subdued it quickly. "You don't want to take time for that, Joe. A table's the last thing in the world we need to bother about."

He looked at her sidewise and winked solemnly, and she was caught between laughter and tears. His look told her more plainly than words that he knew what the small domestic comforts meant to her, and that he didn't intend to be prevented from wasting an hour for her comfort.

Barbara and Tad had collected a good heap of stones, and Joe started building a fireplace. Emma knelt beside him.

"Let me do this."

"Aren't you tired?"

"I've done nothing except ride for three days," Emma said scornfully.

"You can leave the camp to us."

"Well, if you're sure you can make it--"

Emma's eyes twinkled, "We're sure."