Annie did not climb down from the wagon. “So you’ve heard?”

Luke came hurrying out of the house, his arms laden with blankets. He stumbled and went sprawling, spilling everything he carried. He tromped half the blankets into the mud while he picked up the rest, letting them fall out of their folds and trail on the ground. He heaved them into the back of the wagon without any attention to the way they landed. Nelly was screaming futilely at Finis and Luke. Annie knew her only by reputation, having seen her but once or twice and very briefly even then. It was said that she was almost as slow-minded as Luke, and now she seemed to have lost even that in her fright.

Annie shouted, “Where’s the boy, Cyrus?”

Nobody answered her. They were all too busy hollering at one another. Annie saw the boy coming out of the cabin, dragging a sack of cornmeal too heavy for him to carry. Annie caught Mordecai’s eye and pointed. Mordecai stepped down from his dun horse and went to the boy’s aid.

Finis cried to no one in particular, “We lost Isaac. God help us, we lost Isaac. Them Meskins massacreed him with all them others at the Alamo.”

Annie saw that the boy Cyrus was crying. She climbed down from the wagon and took him into her arms.

The boy sobbed, “Uncle Isaac. They killed Uncle Isaac.”

Annie could only hold him. She knew nothing to say that would lessen the loss.

The Blackwoods had not even begun hitching up their team of mules. Without being told, Mordecai took that chore upon himself. He had them harnessed and ready for the wagon when Finis screamed. Annie jerked her head in his direction. He was pointing toward the trail from which the Lewis wagons had come. “It’s the Meskins! They’re on us!”

Annie blinked, trying to clear her eyes. She saw three horsemen. At the distance it was impossible to tell anything about them.

Finis yelped, “They’ll kill us, Luke! They’ll kill the both of us!” He jerked the long lines from Mordecai’s hands, threw the collar off one of the mules and jumped up onto its back.

Annie demanded angrily, “Finis, what’re you fixin’ to do?”

“They won’t kill women and children, but they’ll butcher us men. Git on that mule, Luke. We got to git out of here.”

Luke had always done whatever Finis told him. He swung onto the second mule without even taking the collar off. Finis kicked his mule in the belly and set off in a run, showering mud behind him. Luke followed, taking much of the mud.

Annie forgot whatever ladylike upbringing her mother had managed to give her. Shaking her clenched fist, she shouted, “You cowardly sons of bitches, you come back here! God damn you to Hell, Finis Blackwood!”

Mordecai stared at her in amazement.

Nelly stood looking after her fleeing husband and brother-in-law. She blubbered incoherently.

Annie was about to tell Mordecai he had better run too, for he was old enough that the Mexicans might regard him as a man and kill him. But the approaching riders were closer now. To her relief she saw that they wore no uniforms. They were American. One of them had a familiar way of sitting in the saddle. She blinked hard, trying to clear the tears that persisted in burning her eyes.