Daughter of Fortune Read Online Free PDF Page A

left her shoes
behind in that tainted grove, but she was not going back for
them.
    The buzzards still roosted in the floodplain,
huddled together like the Indians of yesterday, waiting for the sun
to warm them. The trees of the grove were so full of the scavengers
that the branches bent close to the ground.
    She looked around her. The bodies, which might have
been recognizable yesterday, had been picked over by the buzzards.
They bore no resemblance to human beings anymore, but were only so
much rotting meat now, bloated and stinking. Maria retched,
spitting up water and bile. She wiped her mouth with the back of
her hand and then covered her nose and breathed through her mouth.
She approached the burned wagons slowly, watching where she
stepped, determined this time not to tread on anything that might
once have been human.
    Most of the wagons had been destroyed by flames. She
approached the few that remained. There was the smallest chance
that the jewelry had gone undetected, she told herself,
scrupulously keeping her mind on the wagons and not on the death
around her.
    She walked carefully among the wagons and came upon
her own. Young Miguel was slumped forward over the wagon box. An
arrow driven completely through his back had pinned him to the wood
beneath. He had been scalped and his head picked clean by the
buzzards.
    As Maria stepped over the body to get into the
wagon, her foot accidentally struck the corpse. Evil-smelling gas
wheezed out of the arrow wound and a cloud of flies rose and then
settled again. Maria leaned over the edge of the cart and retched
until she felt that her stomach would turn inside out.
    She trembled as she knelt in the wagon. The fire had
gone out before it consumed everything. She found her bundle of
clothing, ripped and shredded by knives. She burrowed deeper in the
pile. Nothing. The cask was gone.
    Maria sagged against the wagon bed, blinking back
tears. She had been foolish beyond all reason to hope that the
Indian raiders would not find her prize. That pitiful handful of
baubles represented her only chance, her entire future. They were
gone now, and she was left with the muddy dress she sat in.
    She remained in the wagon until the stench of death
forced her out, then she clambered over the side of the high cart
and shinnied down the partially burned wheel, unwilling to pass
Miguel again.
    She was thirsty again, hungry and dirty—but not
alone. When the sun was higher in the sky, the buzzards drove her
out from among the wagons. They flew back to yesterday’s banquet
and continued feasting where they had left off, ripping and tearing
at the corpses. Maria ran back to the river. By now, the smell was
no better there, but at least she would not have to watch the
scavengers or hear the dreadful noises they made as they fought
over the scraps remaining.
    Her stomach rumbled and ached. Earlier Maria had
told herself that she could never eat again, not after witnessing
the buzzards, but here she was now, holding her middle and rocking
back and forth. The jerked meat and hardtack that she had only
tolerated for six months would have tasted like the best food her
mother had ever prepared.
    She unbuttoned her dress and took it off, shimmying
out of her petticoat and chemise. Perhaps she could wash her
clothing and rid it of the smell of death. It could dry on the
banks of the river. Then, in clean clothes, she could start walking
toward the Sangre de Cristos. She had no idea what waited for her
beyond the circle of death, but it could not be any worse.
    Teeth chattering, her skin dimpled with cold, she
scrubbed with river sand until her fingers ached. Then she spread
the garments out on the bank and sat down to wait.
    The cold defeated her. When she couldn’t stand
another minute of the breeze on her body, she pulled on her
chemise. Damp as it was, the skimpy covering reached to her knees
and afforded some protection. She waited another hour, then tied on
her petticoat. She was walking toward