The Pesthouse Read Free

month!'
    Franklin knew better than to argue with his volcanic brother. He did not even shake his head. He watched Jackson mull over their problem for a few moments more, his eyes half closed, his lips moving, his fingers counting days. 'That knee'll snare us here a month, if not a month, then half a month. Too long,' Jackson added finally. 'By then the winter'll be on us like a pack of wolves. You hear me, little brother?' Little brother? Less in everything. 'You sit down now, then, that's the end of it. We're carrion.'
    This was their final argument, the last of many, with Franklin daring to protest that his 'crazy' brother should press on to the coast without him (but not meaning it — who'd want to be abandoned to the winter and the woods, to be buried, along with the trail, beneath layers of mud, leaves and snow, even if it meant a few days free of bullying and censure?) and Jackson insisting that he'd stick by his infuriating, timid, blushing sibling till the last, if he really had to (but resenting Franklin's physical weakness, his infuriating, girlish laugh that seemed to buckle his whole body, his dreaminess, his hypochondria, and saying so repeatedly — 'That bitching knee's not half as bad as you make out' and 'Where'd we be if every time you got a touch of charley horse you wanted three days' rest?' — until Franklin said, 'Ma's hearing every word you speak').
    The brothers should not have taken their ma's advice two months before when they'd 'embarked' so late in the season of migration. 'Carry nothing with you,' she'd said, 'then no one will pay you any heed. And you can hurry on.' So they had left the plains equipped with just their boots, their knives, a double set of clothes rain-proofed with deer fat, a spark stone and some tinder in a pouch, a water bag and a back sack each, full of nothing-worth-stealing or so they thought: some cheese, dried fruit, salted pork and a couple of ground tarps.
    To some extent their mother had been correct. They had moved fast, and no one had bothered them yet, while anyone else among the emigrants who'd been rash enough to travel in the company of carts and animals or had packed a year's supply of food and their prize possessions — best pots, jewelry, good cloth, good tools — paid a price for their comfort. The more they had, the more cruelly they were robbed, not by the other travelers but by the ones who wouldn't emigrate until they'd picked the carcass of America clean. But possibly two men like them — young, strong and imposingly tall — would not be robbed, even if they were walking naked with shards of polished silver in their beards. Jackson and Franklin Lopez, together, looked too capable of taking care of themselves to invite the attentions of thieves. And this had made them much valued as companions by other travelers, especially as their extra strength would always be prized by any wagoner, for example, who faced a hill or mud, and would recompense them with a meal if only they would be his heavy horses for the afternoon.
    No, Ma was right, wagons were slow and cumbersome. They might not have stomachs, feet and knees to let their owners down, but their axles snapped if stressed too much, and they were unsteady on gradients and hesitant at fords, with good reason. Rivers loved to test the strength of vehicles. A river's always pleased to have the opportunity to dismantle a wagon, to tear it into planks and carry it away in bits, together with its wagoner. Horses were less hesitant. They were fast and muscular. They didn't refuse the rivers or the gradients, so long as there were sticks and sugar lumps to urge them on, but they were flesh and bones and prone to injury and sickness. Just like men and women. But, just like men and women, horses' running costs were high, for oats and hay, board and lodging, tolls and tack.
    Pack mules were the toughest of the lot. And cheap. More so than hinnies. A bucket of Cottonwood bark or thistle and bitter water every