Goldeline by Jimmy Cajoleas (i read books txt) 📕

“Why’d you leave me?” he says. “I been looking everywhere for you. We got to go, Goldeline. They know about us. The Preacher’s been here. You won’t believe all the kinds of stuff he said about us. They got us for assault and witchcraft and banditry and all kinds of things, stuff I never even heard of. And it isn’t just you, Goldeline. It’s me too. They know all about Zeb. The Preacher must have come back and found him. We got to hurry.” He shakes me a little. “I said come on. We got to hurry.”

I must have started crying again, because Tommy stops shaking me.

“What’s wrong?” he says.

“They killed him,” I say. “The Preacher killed Gruff.”

He blinks at me like he can’t believe it. Like he finally sees me for who I am.

“That’s who you were taking us to? The thief?”

“He was the only person I had,” I say.

“He was a bandit,” says Tommy. “A real one. An evil man. He used you to rob people. Don’t you understand that?”

“He loved me,” I say. “He was my only one.”

“No he wasn’t,” says Tommy. “You got me.”

Men with lanterns are off in the distance, heading toward us.

“That’s them,” he says. “Goldeline, we got to go.”

He looks taller now, braver somehow.

“Get up! They’re going to kill us!”

“I don’t care if they do,” I say. “It was all a lie, Tommy. Everything Gruff told me about Moon Haven. All the stories he told me about the Half-Moon Inn.”

Tommy looks at me real curious for a second.

“Too bad we didn’t make it here in time,” he says quietly. “It would have really been something to see.”

“But don’t you understand?” I say. “The stories weren’t true. The Half-Moon Inn was just an old dump.”

“How do you know?” he says. “You only saw it burned down, same as I did. Who knows what it looked like before then? I wouldn’t doubt it was just the same as you told me it would be. I wouldn’t doubt if it was even grander than in all the stories.”

I gaze at Tommy a moment in wonder. It’s like he understands something I don’t, like he’s reminding me of something I nearly forgot.

“I believe the stories you told me, Goldeline,” he says. “I believe every word. Now we got to go.”

The men are coming faster now, they’ve spotted us.

“Get up, Goldeline,” he says. “Get up!”

Tommy yanks me up to my feet, and it’s like he’s pulling me out of a dream. Tommy’s right. We can’t get caught here, not like this.

An orange cat struts and stretches itself out on the busted boardwalk. I think it’s the same one as before. It’s looking right at me, eyes gold and aglow. What do you say, kitty? Its tail loops up like a question mark, and I know.

“This way,” I say.

Tommy and me run to the closest storefront. The cat hops through a busted window smooth and quick as a ghost. The window is smashed and jagged with glass. I got to step careful through it. Tommy catches his knee on the glass and the skin rips and I think he’s going to scream but he shuts his mouth and grimaces it down. The store inside is wrecked, a druggist’s, little vials and bottles and powders all dark and horrible in the moonlight. It’s a strange world the night gives you, when medicine bottles cast shadows like demons in every corner. Outside the men gather, peek through the busted window, their lanterns and torches shining at us. We clutch each other behind a shelf full of bottles and try to become as small as possible. I scoot us toward the back of the store and a bottle falls. It’s just a tiny one, a hair tonic. Tommy reaches out to catch it but it tumbles off his fingers. The shatter makes every bone in me cringe.

The men heard it too. They bang on the door of the store, they kick until the lock breaks and they’re inside and I know we’re done for.

The orange cat looks up at me with her big eyes and shakes her head at me. She licks my palm, her tongue rough and hard, then meows her loudest.

No! I hiss. Don’t tell them where we are!

The kitty looks back at me as if to smile, and struts toward the front of the store.

“Holy Lord, it’s just a cat,” says one of the men.

“Best not be using the Lord’s name in vain,” says another one. “Not while we’re working for the Preacher anyhow.”

“Shoot, he ain’t here. He’s off in the woods, hunting out escapees from the inn. He don’t got a clue what we’re doing.”

“The Lord’s got ears everywhere,” says another. “That’s what the Preacher says. The Lord’s angels can hear everything you say, even everything you think. Then the angels come and whisper it right in his ear. That’s what he says, anyhow.”

“You believe him?”

“You seen what happens when folks don’t believe him? They wind up dead. Shoot, if that’s the case, I’ll believe every word the man says.”

“Well, either way, if we catch these two, it surely will get us on his good side. Like the Book says, cover a whole multitude of sins.”

“It says ‘Love covers over a multitude of sins,’ idiot, not nabbing a couple of little kids.”

“Whatever. Just so long as we’re on his good side, I don’t much care one way or the other about love.”

They walk off down the road slow and careful, shining their lights in every window, searching for us. It’s a strange thing, being hunted. I feel like my momma back on her death day, when they came by the house for her, when she sent me away to hide, when Gruff came and got me and brought me out to the woods.

When the men are good and gone, me and Tommy sneak back out the front door. Tommy limps a little from his knee but not much. When we pass the old oak I stop. I have