Page 43 of The Heart’s Charge

As one, all the boys turned at the sound.

“Rawley!” One of the boys called out their leader’s name, and then the herd ran off to meet him where he stood on the back porch with Sam.

Only one little dogie lingered behind. “You really gonna find Wart?”

Jonah nodded. “A Horseman don’t quit until the job’s done.” He just prayed that when they found Wart, the boy would still be alive.

His gut told him that someone was taking these boys for a purpose. The fact that no bodies had been found lent credence to his assumption, but that knowledge didn’t comfort him as much as it should have. Death wasn’t always the worst option in cases like these. He prayed the boys who’d been taken were still in the area. Hidden somewhere. Waiting to be found. If they’d been sold, or shipped off to places unknown, they’d be much harder to track down.

“It’s my fault the snatchers got ’im.”

The small voice sharpened Jonah’s focus back on the child in front of him. “Why d’ya say that?” He tried to keep his voice patient, sympathetic, but his hunger for details that could provide a solid lead made restraint difficult.

“I didn’t want to stay at the livery with him last night.” The kid stared at the ground, his hands balling into fists at his sides. “I knew you’d seen me.” Blue eyes tinged with accusation rose to glare at Jonah. “If you squealed, told Mr. Donaldson what you’d seen, Wart could lose his job. He weren’t supposed to let any of his riffraff friends into the livery after dark.”

The kid tossed a glance over at the boys by the porch, then turned back to Jonah. “Rawley has a place outside of town where we stay sometimes, a lean-to with a stash of food and blankets hidden in an old trunk. I was gonna meet up with some of the others there. But with the snatchers on the loose, Wart wouldn’t let me go alone. We had to wait ’til after dark so Wart could sneak away without anyone noticing, but we’d barely made it to the edge of town before he started looking over his shoulder. He told me it was nuthin’, but I knew he was lyin’. He started walkin’ faster. Grabbed my hand. I looked behind us but didn’t see anyone.

“After we left the road, Wart calmed down some. I thought whatever had spooked him was gone. Then I heard the footsteps. Running. Getting closer. Wart shoved me away from him, grabbed a tree branch off the ground, and yelled for me to run. But I couldn’t. I couldn’t leave him there. I looked for a branch I could use, but all I found was a bunch of useless twigs. Too small to help. Just like me. That’s when he yelled at me again. Told me to fetch Rawley.”

The boy swallowed. Glanced away. Almost fast enough to hide the moisture shimmering in his eyes, but not quite. “I ran as fast as I could.” His voice clogged. He shut his mouth and kicked at the dirt.

Jonah pushed to his feet and clasped the kid’s shoulder, surprised at how thin the bones felt beneath the baggy coat he wore. He must be wearing three or four layers. Probably every stitch of clothing he owned.

“You did the right thing,” Jonah said, his voice gruff. There was nothing worse than feeling helpless in battle. Unable to help a brother under attack.

“I let my brother be taken!”

Jonah narrowed his gaze. “No. You accomplished his mission.”

“What . . . mission?” The kid’s face scrunched as he sniffed and rubbed his nose with his coat sleeve.

“Any good soldier puts his mission first. Wart’s mission was to ensure you arrived at your destination unharmed. His own safety was irrelevant. All that mattered was protecting you. If you had stayed behind and tried to help him, both of you would have been taken, and no one would know anything about what had happened. Wart’s mission would have failed. But when you obeyed his order to retreat, you accomplished his mission. Not only did you escape harm, but you collected valuable information that we can use to track down Wart. In war, information is as vital to mission success as guns and bullets. Sometimes more. You’re a witness, young man. A witness who can help us track down the snatchers and rescue their captives.”

“Me?” Disbelief clouded the kid’s eyes, but hope edged those clouds with a golden glow. “I didn’t hardly see nuthin’.”

Rawley strutted toward the barn, his gang dogging his every step. Wallace and Miss Katherine followed, Mark toting a second washtub and Miss Katherine a kettle. Jonah thumped Wart’s brother gently on the back. “Don’t worry, kid. You know more than you think you do. Trust me.”

“Hey, Al,” Rawley called as he approached. “I know ya don’t like baths, but we’re all takin’ one. The ladies here are strict about dirt. They got hot food ready to set on the table but won’t let us in unless we’re clean.”

Al adamantly shook his head.

The older boy came alongside and draped his arm over Al’s shoulders. “It ain’t so bad. See?” He held out his other arm for inspection. “They even gave me clean clothes to wear. There’s enough new duds for everyone.”

“I ain’t doin’ it, Rawley.” Al pushed away from his mentor, eyeing Wallace as if he were the devil incarnate carrying a tub full of brimstone instead of hand-me-down clothes. He backed away. “I’ll just stay in the barn. I don’t need no dinner.”

Rawley’s face hardened. “All the boys is doing it, Al. You included. Now get goin’.” He jerked his chin toward the open barn door. “I ain’t gonna miss that food I been smellin’ ’cause you’re too baby to get in a tub of water.”

The other boys snickered.

Wallace came up to Rawley and handed the tub to him. “Get some of your boys to fill this at the pump and drag it inside. Al and I will be inside in a minute.”

Al was gonna bolt. Jonah could feel panicked energy coiling up in the kid. Miss Katherine’s sweet smile and calm manner didn’t even help. She described warm bathwater first, then went on to list all the mouth-watering details of what dinner would entail.

It didn’t matter a bit. Al bolted between the fresh buttered biscuits and fried ham. Kid was fast too. If Jonah hadn’t been anticipating the move, Al probably would have gotten away. Instead, Jonah scooped the kid off the ground with an arm around his midsection and did his best to dodge the flailing arms and kicking legs. But when a high-pitched, blood-curdling scream nearly busted his eardrum, it was all Jonah could do not to drop the little beggar on his hind end.

The shriek brought Rawley running out of the barn, knife out, ready to defend one of his own. Wallace winced and plugged his ears with his fingers. But it was Miss Katherine who surprised Jonah the most. She set down her kettle and walked up to the wild child as if her ears were completely unaffected. Jonah did his best to hold the kid still so he couldn’t head-butt the teacher or ram his heels into her ribs, but she proved intelligent. She circled around behind Jonah, then tapped his shoulder.

“Could you bend down, please, Mr. Brooks?”