Frank laughed. “A pretty good story, but it’d make a better yarn if it had some wild Indians in it.”

Shipman shrugged. “We do the best we can with what the Lord sees fit to give us.”

He didn’t ask James, but he spoke to Frank, Annie, and Hope. “You can either cross the river now and travel a good ways before night, or you can rest here and get a fresh start in the mornin’. I’ll see you safely across before I go home.”

Frank was more sparing of James’s feelings. “What do you think, James? Reckon we hadn’t better be goin’ on?”

James was grateful for the recognition from his cousin. “I say we go now. We can make a few miles with the daylight we’ve got left.” The longer they waited, he thought, the greater the chance Díaz would find them.

Frank nodded at Shipman. “That’s how it is, then. We’re all anxious to get over into Texas.”

Shipman looked pleased. “That would’ve been my choice, but it’s your family.” He started down the slope toward the river, letting James and the wagons and the livestock follow after him. Shipman rode back and forth in the edge of the water, seeking the place where the bottom would be firmest. By the time the wagons reached the river, he had found it.

James feared they might have to double the teams and take the wagons across one at a time, but the ford was shallow and made that unnecessary. He rode close to Annie’s wagon, ready to help her if an emergency should arise. None did. Annie was as cool as a professional mule skinner. She talked the mules across, her voice steady and reassuring, without the profanity he would have felt obliged to use. Mules were dependable most of the time, if somewhat on the stubborn side. But water could throw them into a quick panic if anything went awry, if their feet suddenly failed to reached bottom, and especially if they began to flounder and get water in their ears. James had seen mules go crazy and drown themselves. Given a little bad luck, they could take somebody with them.

The crossing was uneventful. James rode back to where Frank’s two boys waited with the loose stock and helped drive the animals across in the wake of the wagons. As they came up onto the opposite bank, Edward asked, “Is this Texas?”

“It is.”

“What if they catch us and throw us out again?”

“We’ll keep comin’ back in spite of them. But this time we don’t aim to let anybody catch us. Get down, Edward, and help me brush out these tracks.”

James found a heavy branch that the wind had broken from a tree. He dragged it back and forth across the wet tracks left by wagons and animals. Edward came along behind him with a much smaller branch and finished the work. It would be almost impossible to get the ground completely smooth, but sunshine would soon sap the water from the sand, and wind would shift enough of the dry surface that only the most observant could know someone had passed this way.