Free Listen to the Mockingbird by Penny Rudolph Page A

heart would fairly wrench inside me to see him standing, feet slightly apart, one hand on the dining room table, head tilted down so the thick shock of red-blond hair fell across his brow, those same eyes filled with such a lonely sadness. It was those times I would know that if I just tried hard enough, I could repair whatever had gone crooked inside him.
    A few months after he stole that hat, Andrew received orders to report to Fort Craig. We packed and began the journey southeast with a couple dozen others. The other officers were single, so Winona and I were the only women.
    Andrew had entered one of his silent periods; and interpreting this to mean he had truly changed, I set out quite happy, believing everything might be different at Fort Craig. When we reached the Rio Grande, we turned south on a well-traveled trail. One of the men rode alongside our wagon pointing out landmarks. We were on the Camino Real, he said, the road cut by the Spaniards two hundred years before; and it excited me to be seeing the same rocks, the same soil beneath our wagon wheels as those first explorers.
    We camped where a second river joined ours from the north. Wanting to explore a little, I went to find Fanny. She was obviously bored with following the wagons and welcomed the saddle.
    “Where do you think you’re going?” Andrew’s voice came from behind me. We were quite alone between the tent and the stream.
    “To see what there is to see,” I said. “It’s lovely here. Why don’t you come, too?”
    “Go back to the tent. You are not to leave it.”
    “I won’t go far.”
    He took a step toward me. “Get back in the tent. You’re the only woman here.”
    “No, I’m not. There’s Winona. I’ll take her with me if you want.” I was holding the harness, preparing to insert the strap into Fanny’s mouth.
    “Get back in the tent.”
    I turned to look him straight in the eye and kept my voice calm and low. “Please believe me. I won’t go far. I only want to ride a bit.”
    Andrew snatched the reins from my hand, threw them about my neck and twisted. I fell to my knees unable even to gasp as my heart exploded in my ears. He twisted the straps again and I thought my head would burst. My heart near beat its way out of my chest; my lungs didn’t know what to do with the air inside them. Andrew’s face snarled into mine, and the world got black around the edges.
    Chapter Nine
    In his own good time, Andrew loosed his hold and I crumpled to the ground. After that, something inside me changed. Looking back, I confess I am puzzled by my response. I was frightened of Andrew, but I was also afraid that someone might find out. I suppose it was my pride. No one must discover my sordid circumstances. Above all, I detested the thought of becoming an object of pity.
    I no longer deluded myself with the notion that I could “fix” whatever was wrong with Andrew. But instead of going to any of the two dozen men who might help me, I took great pains to hide the bruises and to appear normal. I tied a strip of flannel about my throat and feigned a cough. I was so good at this I was sure even Winona did not know.
    Dazed and unresisting, I continued the trek oblivious to the landscape, to Andrew’s fellow officers and, especially, to myself.
    The following night, Andrew brought Fanny’s reins into our tent and made me sleep with them around my neck.
    Numb, dazed and exhausted, I fell into a troubled sleep until something smashed into my pillow near my ear. My eyes flew open to stare at a hatchet blade buried in the feathers inches from my cheek.
    Andrew stood over me, his pale eyes like chunks of evil glass.
    “Don’t even think about taking my mother’s cherrywood chest,” he said, his voice low and deadly. “All those pretty gold pieces were not hers, but they are mine! And will always be mine. Never yours. Never. If you so much as look at that chest, I will carve you into small pieces of meat and roast you over the fire. I might