Free Never Too Far by Thomas Christopher Page A

gobbled up the remaining jars of food. The horses chomped at the dry grass. He had to find some food in the forest tomorrow, but with only nine bullets left, he couldn’t waste any shots.
    They lay down on the blankets spread near the wagon, and Joe stared up at the stars that looked like scattered bits of crushed glass. He gazed at the moon. There was no use in pretending he wasn’t afraid because he was, pure and simple. Going into the forest was what he’d feared from the very start, but he’d put it out of his mind to focus on getting across the plains. There was no escaping it now. From what Frank had experienced in the forest—the cold, the dark, the thieves, the refugees in rags, the violence—Joe knew this could be the most threatening part.
    “You ever been in the forest before?” he asked Mary. In retrospect he thought that was a stupid question to ask. He’d only asked because he was nervous and wanted to talk about it. “Of course, you haven’t. The longest journey you’ve been on is probably when you came to our place.”
    He got out his recorder, put it together, and played a song. He blew softly into the mouthpiece, just a whisper, so the sound was hushed like a sigh. He played a verse and then sang a verse.
    “I know dark clouds will gather ‘round me,
    I know my way is rough and steep,
    But golden fields lie out before me,
    Where Virid’s lambs their safety keeps.”
    When he finished, he sang a lullaby to help Mary go to sleep. She was most likely scared like him, so he wanted to soothe her mind and let her know he wouldn’t let anything bad happen to her.
    “Sleep my child and stars attend thee,
All through the night
The moon its silver light will send thee,
All through the night
Soft the drowsy darkness creeping,
Hill and dale in slumber sleeping
I my loved ones’ vigil keeping,
All through the night.”
    During the night, Joe awoke suddenly. He felt as if someone had jabbed him in the shoulder. He grabbed the Calvin rifle beside his leg and twisted his head one way and then the other, trying to peer into the darkness to see if anyone was there. Mary’s head was resting on his chest, which surprised him. She must’ve been afraid and moved closer to him to feel safer, to take comfort in his warmth and the sound of his heart. She seemed like a child to him at that moment, although there was something else there that he couldn’t define yet. He gently squirmed out from beneath her and crept around the wagon. He stared across the dark surface of the swaying land. He searched the darkness for anything that seemed strange, not that he would know, because it all seemed strange.
    After a while, when he was satisfied that his imagination was making the darkness come alive and it was only a dream that had stirred him, he returned to Mary. But he barely slept the rest of the night.   
     

 
     
    Chapter 16
     
     
     
    Joe stopped the wagon in front of the entrance to the forest. The size of it was like nothing he’d ever set eyes on before. The tops of the looming trees rustled and shook in the wind like the clouds of a thunderstorm or the wave of an oncoming duster billowing across the plains. Joe felt at any moment that the rolling treetops were going to crash over him and send him tumbling away. 
    He flicked the reins and the wagon moved out of the sunlight into the dark forest depths. Everything became eerily silent, as if they had entered the belly of an animal, where the sounds of the outside world no longer existed. Dark tree trunks lined both sides of the road like giant stakes speared into the ground. Anything could be hiding behind them, waiting and watching. The wagon creaked and bumped over the rough road. Joe scanned the forest, trying to peer through the thick web and see what was hidden.
    No more than a few miles in, the driver’s side tire blew with a loud pop. The cab dropped abruptly to the left. Mary flew across the bench and crashed into Joe, which knocked him