The Red Heart

by JAMES ALEXANDER Thom

  Without the physical discomforts, which kept bothering and annoying her in waves, she might have slipped entirely away into deathly despair. But finally she remembered telling herself yesterday to be brave. She would be brave and she would not cry out.

  Now she realized that her hands were free, and there was no reason why she couldn’t have been trying to get the awful gag out, no reason except that she had been too scared to think or to try anything the Indians might not like.

  So she reached with her cold-benumbed hands and tried to claw the tight binding off. It cut even harder into the corners of her mouth. But the strip of linsey-woolsey was wet with rain and drool, and it stretched, and at last she worked it down past her lower teeth and then her chin, and then she was free to reach into her mouth and draw the spit-soaked rag out.

  Never had she put into her mouth anything so delicious that it equaled the pleasure of pulling out that awful wad of cloth. She took deep breaths through her open mouth and lolled her tongue around, licking her teeth and palate, moistening them and ridding them of the woolen taste. She dropped the sodden rag on the ground.

  The man behind her stopped and said something to the man carrying her, and he stopped and turned. The gag lay there on the trail, a pale thing that even she could see dimly against the wet-dark leaves. She wished she had not dropped it. Now they knew she was rid of it and probably would gag her again.

  But the man carrying her just stood silent for a moment, then said something in his language to the other, turned and resumed his way. The one behind stooped and picked up the rag.

  She did not say anything for a while, but, knowing she could talk, wanted to. Soon she built her nerve up to say, “Wareham?”

  She felt the Indian tense, but he said nothing, and Wareham answered, “What?” Both of the Indians spoke to each other briefly, but kept moving along the path.

  Speaking softly, she asked Wareham, “Is thee well?”

  In a voice that sounded as if he were on the verge of crying, his answer came: “I’m so cold, and oh I need to pee.”

  How heartening it was to be speaking, just saying something. She had hardly ever had to go so long without chatting. “Oh, I too!” she exclaimed. “If these gentlemen understood a word of English, I’d tell them so, though I should blush to speak of such a matter to a stranger—”

  “Heh-uh!” the man grunted, squeezing her so abruptly with his arm that she nearly squirted. She understood him to mean she must be quiet. Maybe these Indians were still afraid that her father would catch them.

  And so she kept quiet, growing ever more miserable. The Indians walked on and on in the darkness, and after a while Frances became aware that the slope was going down the other way, and it was steeper, and the men were climbing down, and it seemed to be hard going on the wet path. The jolting got worse and the rain grew colder and colder, and Frances was becoming almost sick to her stomach from being carried so long this way. From time to time she remembered her mother’s outstretched arms and anguished face and would sob awhile, being more miserable and afraid than she could remember ever having been, and afraid this would never end.

  But her mother had always said, if thee be patient and behave well and have faith in the Lord God and keep His Light shining within thee, all will be well, by and by.

  A sound like an owl’s call very close by brought Frances awake, and she opened her eyes and saw nothing but water. Cold, dark gray water was running just below her. The Indian man who carried her was wading nearly waist deep. It was not yet daylight, but she could make out the form of the man carrying Wareham, just behind and to one side. In fear of being dropped into the cold river, Frances clutched at the straps and thongs that held the Indian’s bag and powder horn and hung on to them.

  Then she heard the owl call again, and realized that it was uttered by the man carrying her. An answering call came faint over the gurgle of the river current. Her Indian made the call again, and once more the distant answer returned.

  They waded out of the river across a rocky, pebbly shore and passed through a thicket, ascending a low bluff. Now Frances began to sense the presence of more people. She could smell wood smoke and tobacco smoke. She heard and smelled horses. The man murmured cheerfully and was answered by other voices in the gloom.

  When he stooped and slipped her off his shoulder with a long sigh, she was so dizzy in the head and numb in the legs that she fell down, among roots and icy mud. He walked away.

  She was at last out of the grip of the fearsome man who had dragged her from her home and carried her on his shoulder a whole night long. She was on the cold ground and could not stand, but just sat slumped on the bare ground. She was too tired even to hold her bladder any longer, and she just relaxed and let go and was aware of the wet smell of her warm urine in the cold air and didn’t know whether she was wetting her dress, nor did she care. It took her a long time to drain, and she sat in a stupor, aware of people walking around, and horse hooves, and some little yellowish fireglow here and there, though no flames were visible. She did not know where Wareham was. She felt cold sensations speckling her hands and bare legs, and gazed around and saw that the rain had turned to snow.

  Snow, she thought. The first time it had snowed the previous winter, she and her brothers and sisters had had a celebration of it, running with outstretched arms and laughing faces upturned to the flakes. This was the first snow of this year, but it didn’t lift her heart. It crushed it, made it hurt for her absence from her family. That first snow of last winter, she remembered in her memory’s eye, had fallen on ground covered with bark and wood chips left from the recent building of the Slocums’ hewn-log house. Falling on the unfamiliar ground of this riverbank, the snow was bleak and forbidding.

  She heard the warrior’s voice. He was coming back. She felt herself being lifted onto a horse, set astride its withers, and the Indian man got on behind her. He reached around her to hold the reins, then urged the horse forward to a place where other horses and riders were gathering. Frances saw sparks arcing and swirling in smoke and snow where some men were scattering and quenching campfires. The sparks looked warm and lovely. She was so chilled. She yearned for hearth fire.

  With many men’s voices speaking low, the horses and riders, and many men on foot, began moving uphill away from the river. The sky was growing pale with morning light, the steep ground lightening with snow, and Frances saw that the line of men and horses was long. She could hear the horses’ hooves thudding softly, but the Indians trotting along on foot were silent as ghosts. She had no idea how they had come to this place or what direction they were going now, but was sure wherever they were going would be farther still from her family and home.

  Her bare feet throbbed and tingled with cold. Her nose was running and she was so cold that she had begun to tremble. The only warmth in this whole vast, frigid night was from the horse’s withers between her legs and the Indian man’s chest at her back. The cold air crisped her nostrils and she sneezed, and sneezed again. She needed to cough after the sneezing, and then sniffled and shuddered.

  Behind her the Indian was twisting, doing something. In a moment, then, she was enveloped in a blanket, which he was holding around her with his arms. It smelled of bear oil and horse and old wood smoke.

  She had been so cold for so long that it was a while before she quit shuddering. Gradually the warmth of the Indian’s body and hers within the blanket diffused through her, and her hands and legs tingled and buzzed with fatigue. The rhythmic motion of the walking horse lulled her. Her thoughts and fears dissolved and she could no longer keep her eyes open. The dim snowy forest vanished, and Frannie Slocum dreamed.

  She was in the wagon coming from a place called Rhode Island, the place where she had been born. Oxen pulled the wagon, which had a canvas roof. The wagon creaked and swayed and jolted over the rough road, and the ride seemed to go on forever, taking her away from the home she had known, and the only solace was the nearness of her mother, who held her in her lap
enveloped in a blanket, keeping her warm with her body.

  Now and then she would come partly awake, and it was not her mother’s body heat warming her, but an Indian’s.

  When she fully awoke, it was snowing heavily in the woods, the snow coming down aslant and sticking to the dark trunks and leafless limbs of the trees. The whole frightful thing that was happening came back to her, and her heart clenched with fear, and her chin began to quiver.

  But she remembered then that she had sworn to herself she would be brave like her mother, so she did not whimper.

  But her bottom was sore and the insides of her legs were chafed from the long time on the horse. The times her father and her brother Giles had taken her on horseback, they had gone only short distances, never far enough to satisfy her. She could remember leaning back against her brother or her father, feeling safe within their arms even though the ground was far below, knowing that because they cared for her, they would never let her get hurt.

  But this was not someone who cared for her. This was a bad man who had stolen her from home and carried her roughly and put a nasty gag in her mouth.

  Yet he was the warmth against which she leaned. His were the arms that had held a blanket around her and kept her from falling off the horse into the snow while she slept.

  All this and she could not even see him, facing forward away from him like this. Perhaps it was better that she could not. Surely the sight of him would frighten her again. She remembered the glimpse of him as he dragged her out from under the stairs: the painted face, head hairless as an egg … She shuddered again. Her face was cold, and she raised the blanket’s edge to cover it. The pee smell came up within the blanket, and she remembered she had wet this dress once or twice in her fright—either that or she had dreamed it. It was hard to remember what had really happened and what had been nightmare in the awful time since this fearsome man had come yesterday—it had been only yesterday, though it now seemed to have gone on forever.

  Her chin crumpled and forlorn tears puddled in her eyes. How hard it was to be brave when hungry and far from home with no idea where she was going or what would become of her.…

  Oh! Oh!

  I did not pray once, she thought, jolted by shame. In all this time when I should have prayed, I have not! At night her family always prayed together in silence. Her mother had taught her to give prayers of thanks and prayers for strength and wisdom whenever her mind was quiet, and especially when her soul was unquiet. Now it was a terrible morning after the most awfully frightful night, and yet she had not spoken to God, not once in all this awful time, had not even thought of speaking to God!

  Oh, she thought, I deserve to be as wretched as I am!

  And so she tried now to pray, to pray inward to that part of the Light of God that her father and mother said was in every human heart.

  Even in this bad Indian’s heart. Neighbors who were not of the Friends’ persuasion often scoffed at her father’s belief that Indians too had the Light of God in their souls. Those neighbors sometimes had shouted at him that Indians didn’t even have souls.

  Dear Jesus Christ, she prayed silently as snowflakes touched her forehead, dear Jesus Christ who shineth in every heart, help me to be good and brave.

  And shine in the heart of this man and tell him he should not be doing this bad thing because it brings grief to good people.

  Or if my papa is following us, she prayed, remembering the Indians looking back the night before, if Papa is following, help him find his way.

  As she understood prayer, it was not an easy or halfhearted matter. Talking to God and Jesus required great attention—or, as her mother called it, concentration. In trying to do that once, Frannie strained so hard that she besmirched her bed. That had been not much more than a year ago. Her mother had laughed softly and told her to strain above the waist, not below, when she prayed. So now Frannie prayed straining so hard around her heart that she shuddered, shaking so hard that she groaned aloud.

  The Indian spoke, saying something right by her ear, and it sounded like a question. Startled by his voice, she turned, and there was his face. He had bent forward to speak to her. It was the first time she had seen his face since that first moment, even though he had been carrying or holding her ever since.

  He looked different. He had wrapped some sort of a scarf or kerchief around his head to cover his baldness against the cold. His face was bony, brown-skinned with a sheen like grease, and in his nose hung a ring of silver. From cheekbone to cheekbone, over his nose, green stripes were painted. Paint on a face! She had never imagined paint on skin! But what was now more striking than anything else, was that this wild and powerful man was smiling.

  This was so utterly unexpected that she blinked several times, staring at him. He repeated his question. She did not know what the words meant, but her mother had taught her to be polite when spoken to, so she replied:

  “Good morning, sir.”

  “Eh, huh,” he said, nodding once, and looked ahead, still smiling. His breath made steam in the air.

  He smiles, she thought. Just like anybody. A man with paint on his face, who cut Nathan’s scalp off, and who steals children—yet he smiles. She turned and faced forward, needing to think of this. She remembered her father always saying that Indians had souls too. If they smiled, it must be true.

  By daylight she could see that several of the riders ahead were soldiers, not Indians. They did not look quite the way she thought soldiers should look, with red coats or big hats such as the king’s soldiers were known to wear. Instead they were dressed in dull green and wore small green caps. But they were surely soldiers, for they were not Indians, and they were all abristle with muskets and swords and hatchets and sheathed knives. Most of the men on horses were these green-coat soldiers; almost all the Indians were afoot, trotting tirelessly through the deepening snow. Even in her wretchedness she wondered how anyone could run day and night without stopping. She saw one of the running Indians reach into a pouch at his side and take something out to put in his mouth. They could even eat without stopping, it seemed.

  She wondered whether her own Indian had a pouch of food, and whether he would be so kind as to give her any of it. She had not eaten anything for a long time. Her mother had never in her life let her miss a mealtime, and this feeling of an empty belly was another thing to unsettle her spirit.

  She remembered hearing her father say Indians never let anyone go hungry if they had anything to share.

  But then, her father had also said the Indians would always be kind to her family. That had turned out not to be so.

  She did not know how to ask the Indian for something to eat. She sighed. Maybe she would just have to wait until he was hungry himself. Maybe when he ate, he would give her some.

  A person who has a soul would feed you, she thought.

  She was thinking about these things when she felt something touching her hair. She turned her head a little and saw that the Indian man had taken a thick strand of her hair between his fingers and was stroking it, pulling it gently and looking at it. Her heart tightened with fear. She had heard all her life about Indians cutting scalps off of people, and only yesterday she had seen one of them doing that to Nathan Kingsley. Now this man was examining her hair as if he might intend to take it. Her hair was a deep red color, thick and slightly wavy. Her mother called it her “crown of glory that fadeth not away,” as it said in the Bible, and almost every day would find time to brush it with Frances sitting before her. All that had made Frances a little vain of her hair; she was aware that nobody else had hair quite the color of hers. Women in the settlement were always going on about it. There was one patch of it on top that was an even brighter red than the rest, and that was the part this Indian was now studying with such interest that she was afraid he must be coveting it. She sat almost breathless with dread.

  But then the Indian man just made a little mmm sound in his throat and let go of her hair and smoothed it with his hand. After a while that
particular fear faded and she was again thinking mainly about how hungry she was and having deep twinges of loneliness for her family.

  The horses had climbed out of the river valley in the early daylight, and their path all morning had been along a high ridge where the snow blew hard, so hard sometimes that the river below was invisible. Now they began descending the other side of the mountain, going down a path so steep that the horses were almost skidding on their rumps. Frannie was always on the verge of slipping or falling forward over the horse’s neck. But the Indian continued to hold her well.

  She heard shouts coming through the snow from the head of the file, which was far down the mountainside, and she was peering down through the snowfall when she saw that Wareham was behind an Indian rider on another horse far ahead. She had not seen him for hours, not since the Indians were carrying them down the mountain on the other side of the valley the night before. He was too far away for her to try to say anything, but she was glad to see him.

  Now from far ahead she thought she heard women’s voices among the shouts. She had not heard a woman’s voice since her own mother’s, yesterday, crying her name. She wondered if she were only imagining women’s voices. Why would there be women’s voices out in an endless snowy woods? She wondered, with a wild new hope in her heart, whether the Indians and soldiers had turned around in the night and were taking her back to the settlement. All the women she knew of were there where she had lived.