Beyond the Horizon Read Free Page B

‘Thats where you got the sails from, the oilcloth.’
    â€˜Took them when I left.’
    â€˜Took the maps too.’
    â€˜Thats right. Took whatever I could fit into a wagon, said I was gonna sail the ocean on the other side of the country.’
    This truth pleased the stranger and he smiled. ‘Instead you end up in this place—place like the Sargasso.’
    The man’s eyes sharpened. His lips drew tight and constricted until they were white.
    â€˜Say something wrong, friend?’ the stranger asked.
    The man shook his head slowly, not taking his eyes from the stranger, who smiled at him like a fool. ‘Just never heard another man talk bout the Sargasso, no one this far inland anyhow.’
    â€˜I’m well traveled,’ the stranger said. ‘Now we’ll need to plan for your leaving. It wont be easy on your woman.’
v
    The man did as the stranger told him to do. He prepared his woman a drink of boiled leaves and squeezings of wild chives. It would help calm her hysteria, the stranger had said. It would also cause in her a deep sleep.
    Only after she fell into slumber did the man leave, kissing her once on the cheek and again on her swollen stomach. He took the saddlebag he filled with meal and maps, the shiv he’d fashioned from a bolt.
    â€˜You must leave in the night,’ the stranger had instructed him. ‘The worry—the anticipation of your leaving—could cause the hysteria to grow.’
    â€˜An what’ll you do then?’ the man had asked.
    They had sat in the nearly completed interior room of the stranger’s abode to discuss the matter as the woman only appeared more and more uneased in the presence of the stranger.
    â€˜I’ll bring her here,’ the stranger said. ‘This is a discreet place, a safe place for her to give birth.’
    â€˜An youve birthed some babies in your time?’
    â€˜I have.’
    The man looked about the shelter. Secretly he was impressed with the stranger, how fast the place took shape. He’d asked how someone goes about making a home so fast once and the stranger simply said such things were a matter of time.
    â€˜You marked out how to go to Fort James?’
    The man nodded. ‘Gonna wear my mule down tryin to get there an back so quick though.’
    The stranger smiled the same awkward smile he rarely let happen. ‘You’ll be back before you know it. You’ll have your woman right with the government. Son’ll be legal too.’
    â€˜You think it’ll be a boy?’
    â€˜I have a sense about these things,’ the stranger said.
    The man kissed his woman’s stomach once more and stole off out the door. He nearly ran into the stranger as he slung the flap door open. In the moonlight both men appeared with shallow features and muted shades.
    â€˜Thought you’d be around tomorrow,’ the man said.
    â€˜Best if I’m here to explain everything in the morn,’ the stranger said. He patted the man’s shoulder. His hand felt warm, soft. ‘Better if you go now.’
    And with that the man left on his mule. He looked over his shoulder once he made some distance, but saw nothing behind him. He looked up into the cosmos, saw Virgo sprawled out, Spica glowing the brightest.
    The woman started awake at the touch of foreign hands around her womb. When she saw who the hands belonged to she scuttled back on her bedding.
    â€˜Eres satanás.’
    The stranger smiled. ‘Me confundes con otra persona. He venido aquí para salvarle.’
    â€˜No,’ the woman said and she pulled her skirt down in an attempt to keep the stranger away from her unborn. He approached still. Outside some birds shrieked. Sun came glowing through the canvas roof of the structure. She cried out for her man.
    â€˜Ã‰l tiene un objetivo para los tontos.’
    The woman shook her head and cried silently. She wrapped her arms around her stomach. Inside the