by Donna Cooner
“You were a good warrior. You learned the courage to know that death is not easy.”
“And war is not all honor.”
“It is my understanding that you are leaving home for a journey?”
“I had planned on a trip. However, if my staying—”
“No, you must carry on with your business. I have listened to your words. There is nothing you can do here. Go, sail away, for Running Bear tells me that sailing is a great pleasure for you, and that it eases your spirit. The winds sweep away the pain of your loss.” He turned, starting to walk away, Alligator following him. But then he turned back. “Our sorrow remains with you. And we are proud that you have spoken for us, against those who would determine that we caused the death of your good wife. I fear that your words often do little good against the tide of hatred that arises between our two peoples, but we are grateful for them.”
“I have spoken nothing but the truth.”
“But to some the truth is hard to see. We remain grateful. Go on your trip, my friend. Perhaps, when you return, you will no longer need to run away from your pain.”
“I travel for business purposes—”
“Indeed. It is good.”
Again, Osceola turned, Alligator close on his heels. Only Running Bear remained behind for a moment, setting a hand upon the White Tiger’s shoulder. His fingers squeezed for a moment. “God go with you.”
“Which god?” The White Tiger queried, a slight smile twisting his lips.
“Didn’t we just agree that the gods were one and the same?”
“We tried to agree. What is going to happen?”
Running Bear shook his head. “I don’t know. I have too much white blood in me. I am sometimes part of the councils, sometimes not. I preach the way of peace as well, but Thompson was a fool to have Osceola arrested. He claimed Osceola was abusive and out of control. You know Osceola. It is my belief that Wiley Thompson wanted to prove that no Indian would dictate terms to him. Now the fury festers in Osceola’s heart. What exactly is in his mind, I don’t know. And there’s more, of course, than the incident with Thompson. There is constantly friction between the Indians and settlers. They say we raid; they hunt our land. They want our land. Little changes. It is the American destiny to stretch all across the continent, isn’t it?”
“There must be a solution.”
“You want a solution. Whether there must be one or not remains to be seen. I must go now, and you must ride on—and then sail away. Perhaps your voyage can bring you happiness. Who knows what you’ll find? Time has passed. You still grieve. You should marry again.”
“I don’t want to marry again,” the White Tiger said flatly.
Running Bear nodded in sympathy, then smiled slightly, setting an arm around the White Tiger’s shoulder once again. “Then perhaps you should at least consider a mistress. Not that you’ve been a monk by any means, or so I’ve been told.”
“Damnit, but it is amazing how such news travels!” the White Tiger began angrily, but then he saw the concern in Running Bear’s eyes, and he sighed and then even laughed softly. “You’ll not leave me be, will you?”
“Surely I will. One day. For now, have a safe voyage.”
“You take heed as well,” he said.
They embraced quickly. Then Running Bear stepped away, turned, and followed the others down a trail. Fluidly, almost silently. In minutes he had disappeared.
For a moment the White Tiger stood in the cypress maze, feeling the breeze once more and again feeling that wheels were turning into motion.
The sun was falling low in the sky. Colors ripped across it, magentas, mauves, golden, glowing reds and yellows, reflecting upon the water, casting an artist’s palette upon the many different trees and brush.
He closed his eyes, felt the breeze on his flesh, smelled the cypress and the hammock, the clean water of the spring, and the musky scent of the marshland that bordered nearby. Listened to the rustle of the leaves. In the far distance he could even hear a swift, smooth plopping sound, one that others might not have heard. But he loved the land, and he had listened to it for a very long time, and he knew that hundreds of feet away an alligator had just slipped from the bank and into the water.
In a far different place the wheels of destiny were also turning.
Forces were being put into motion here as well. They began upon the same day, yet so very differently! There was no forest where she stood. No birds cried, no golden-red sun sat over a cypress wilderness.
Indeed, the young woman stood in one of the elegant homes in one of the most civilized cities of the young American nation. Women were dressed in silks and satins, coffee and tea were poured from silver servers. Persian carpets lay over polished wood floors, damask drapes lay ready to cover the windows from the coming night.
But then the shot rang out.…
Loud, reverberating, like a crack of thunder against the silence that had filled the room.
Amazed, she stared at the man who had sat not a hundred feet from her. He had begun to rise, yet couldn’t. He seemed startled himself.
Tall, well muscled, his iron-gray hair rich upon his leonine head, he had seemed like such an indomitable man. But a bright red spot was burgeoning out on the snow-white frill of his shirt, and no matter how powerful he had always assumed himself to be, it was evident to anyone that he was watching himself die. The shot had been true to the heart. Time seemed to stand still, or to move in incredibly slow motion. And yet, and yet … in split seconds the whole of his shirt turned crimson, and he crashed to the floor, dead.
She looked down at the gun in her hands.
But the bullets in it had been blanks, it had all been fake, it had …
She looked past the dead man and saw a set of eyes staring at her from a cruel, clever face. She heard a faint rustling behind her and turned.
The large parlor had been turned into a playhouse for the day. She had stood on the makeshift stage staring downstage to the audience arranged in a semicircle before her.
She now looked to the backdrop behind her.
And she looked just in time to see the folds of the backdrop curtains fall back into place. Someone had been behind her. Someone who had fired a gun with real bullets just in time to coincide perfectly with her coldly playacted firing of the blank. Her amazement at the circumstances caused a momentary numbness within her.
Then she heard the cries from the horrified audience that arose swiftly around her, cutting cruelly through her shield of surprise.
“Seize her!”
“She’s killed him!”
“Murder!”
“Oh, my God, seize the murderess!”
More screams and shouts arose. Handsome men and beautiful women leapt to their feet. Eyes narrowed upon her, and it suddenly seemed as if she were staring into a crowd of the most primitive savages. Bloodlust—for her blood—seemed to be abundant.
It had been done to trap her. So heinous, so cruel an act, and all to trap her, dear God!
But she wouldn’t be trapped, she wouldn’t let it happen, wouldn’t pay the price for another’s crime. She’d run as far and as fast as she could, she’d run forever.…
Time again stood still.
She met those eyes one last time. The hard, glittering eyes of the man who would command a cold-blooded murder in order to entrap her.
No. She could not let it happen.
She turned. She was young, very swift, graceful, agile. It seemed like an eternity had passed. In reality the dead man had barely hit the floor before she fled, racing for the window.
In the distant, savage forest he felt a shudder rip through him, and sighed deeply. He could pray that the tense situation between the whites and Seminoles would simmer back down.
The wind suddenly rose. Fallen leaves began to swirl and turn, rising into the air. They rustled as if whispering out a warning.
He swore against himself for being fanciful, then gave a whistle for his horse. He mounted and held still
again for a moment. Listening.
The wind died just as quickly as it had come. The leaves were still.
For now.
He nudged his horse and started down the trail.
William! she thought as she slipped through the window, leaving the sounds of screams and motion behind her. Dear God, William! But William could not be entangled in this, and he was with Marina and therefore safe. He would know, of course, he would know that she’d had no choice but to run. He would be sick with worry. He would be afraid.
But he would understand. She was desperate; timing was crucial. She had only seconds.
To run.
Her feet hit the ground, and she began to race, tearing over the manicured lawn, all but flying for the tangle of trees to the rear.
He left the winding trails of cypress behind and came upon the broader road. His horse sensed his mood and began to gallop. He bent low against the creature’s neck and felt the animal begin to move like lightning beneath him. He felt its power, felt its pulse.
Soon he’d be home.
He was anxious to reach it, only so as to be able to leave it. He wanted to feel sea wind sting his cheeks, wanted to escape the mounting tension here, wanted to …
Run.
From the pain that lingered, from the loneliness of the nights, the days.
His horse raced on.
She reached the heavy embrace of the trees, far from the house. They were after her, of course, but they had been confused and slow, and she was well in the lead. She made her way quickly through the trees.
William. Oh, God. William.
She had to find new clothing, first. Change her hair. And move. Keep moving.
She burst from the trees. She was alone in the coming night. She saw the path that would lead from the town center. She started to run hard. Her lungs seemed to be bursting. Agony gripped her legs. Run! she commanded herself. Run … run …
Run away.
Runaway.…
PART ONE
Game of Chance
Chapter 1
The Port of New Orleans
Winter of 1835–36
Jarrett Mckenzie noticed the woman from the moment she first stepped into the entry of the old dockside tavern. Not that he could see much of her at first.
A sweeping, hooded black cape encompassed her from head to toe. He was only certain that it was a woman who had arrived because of the graceful twirl of her body when the master of the establishment, Harold Eastwood, accosted her at the doorway. A new serving maid? Had she joined the ranks of the lovely and available ladies of the New Orleans nights? Was she late reporting for work? Jarrett wondered, and he found himself intrigued, waiting for her to cast off the cloak. If she was working here at Eastwood’s fine dining establishment and parlor, then the class of the place was improving.
Not that Eastwood’s was a total den of iniquity. For a waterfront tavern it could boast being a respectable one. Most men came here when conducting business in this part of Louisiana, and most of them told their wives about the place. There was always good food to be had, pretty girls to sing tunes at the spinet, liquor from around the world, a woman if you wanted one, and now and then a good fight to choose a side for. The place was situated dead center in the port city of New Orleans, right on the river, and all manner of men and women came here, worked here, traded here, schemed here.
New Orleans was a city Jarrett enjoyed. Established in 1718 by the French, it had grown later in the eighteenth century with the Acadian exodus from the northeast. It had passed to Spanish rule and then back to France before Thomas Jefferson had set forth to find a way to make Napoleon willing to accept his offer on the Louisiana Purchase. Jarrett had come here first as little more than a boy himself when Andrew Jackson had commanded the defense of the city against the British in 1815, and since that time Jarrett had felt a fondness for it. He liked the narrow streets of the riverfront, the charming architecture: French, Spanish, and American. He liked the wrought-iron balconies, the small gardens, the rolling Mississippi, and the lusty quality of life along the river. He had come to Eastwood’s often enough, and though it had a dubious reputation, there were far more debauched places than this along the riverfront. All in all this was quite a respectable place when compared with some of the other establishments it neighbored.
But from his very first sight of the woman enveloped in the black cape, Jarrett was convinced she didn’t belong here.
“I fold,” Robert Treat, his friend and associate sitting to his left, said with a sigh. Robert threw his cards down on the oak playing table.
Jarrett stared at his own hand. Three queens. Two fours. Full house. He looked at the bills and gold pieces on the table. Smiling Jack, the rich Creole from the bayou country, sat across from him with a broad grin on his face. Hell. The man might be able to bluff Saint Peter if he ever made it to the pearly gates.
Jarrett took the time to drop a five-dollar gold piece on the table, then looked over the top of his cards again, watching the woman in the encompassing cape. She was still trying to explain something to Eastwood, a little potbellied man. She was slim and lithe, at least an inch or so taller than Eastwood. Jarrett wondered with some amusement if the innkeeper, whoremaster—entrepreneur, as he liked to call himself—didn’t feel just a little bit intimidated by the woman.
Rupert Furstenburg, the lean blond German from St. Louis, threw a wad of money down. “I raise you, gentlemen. A hundred dollars.”
“Damned good thing I’ve folded!” Robert muttered.
“A hundred?” Smiling Jack offered the German a broad smile. “Pocket change. I’ll see you, sir!”
Jarrett was still watching the woman. Robert Treat gave him a nudge. “A hundred, Jarrett.”
“Right,” he said absently. He curled his fingers around the stack of coins in front of him, pushing out the correct amount. Robert Treat stared at him with a frown, lowering his voice.
“Are you paying any attention to this game?”
“Ah, is that the question?” Smiling Jack, twirling his dark mustache, taunted lightly. “Is that plantation of yours down in the swamp doing well enough for this game?”
“My swamp plantation is doing just as well as that place of yours out in the bayou,” Jarrett said lazily. His cards were good enough. And his plantation was sure as hell doing well enough to support this game.
“Ah, mais oui!” Jack murmured. “We’ve both the swamp, eh? The insects, the gators.” He wagged a warning finger at Jarrett. “But you’ve got the Seminoles. What grows on my land is mine. My house has stood seventy years. And yours, mon ami? Poof! Even now the fellows may be sending it up in a cloud of smoke! You were a military man, so I’ve heard. You must know. They slip in, the Indians, they slip out. They move through the night like wraiths. They can move through the thickest brush and trees. There will be more trouble, you mark my words. Old Andy Jackson fought those savages good back in sixteen and seventeen, but he didn’t get them all. There will be trouble again. It’s brewing hot and hard right now. Some say those renegades even ride the alligators through the swamp.”
Jarrett smiled at the Frenchman’s vivid description, even if his smile was somewhat forced. He’d yet to see any man, even a Seminole, riding a gator through the swamp! Jack’s attitude was a fairly common one. People had the damned strangest way of looking at the Florida peninsula—and the Florida Indians. Any of the Upper and Lower Creeks who had moved south, speaking varied languages and coming from very different peoples, were grouped together. They were called Seminoles. Some said the name meant runaway. Others said that it came from the Spanish word for renegade, cimarrón. Runaways, renegades. Jarrett knew that just like him and so many white dreamers, the Indians were just seeking a better life for themselves and their families.
It was a land for dreamers. Despite the summer heat, the abundance of swampland, and the infestation of snakes—and Indians—there were huge land tracts available in the state. Like the western frontiers opening up acros
s the continent, Florida was a raw, new land for Americans. Much of it was exceptionally fine farmland. Crops could sometimes be grown year round. Vicious freezes came upon occasion in the northern part of the territory, and the summer’s heat farther south was sometimes nearly as cruel, bringing sickness and disease. But most often the days were warm and balmy. The sun shone overhead. Blankets of snow did not fall, blizzards did not paralyze whole communities. Wild cattle still roamed the center of the territory from the days of the Spaniards; they were there for the taking. The hunting was extremely rich. There were great herds of deer, a few bison still roamed the northern tracks, and there were countless rabbits and wildfowls. In the hammocks and flatlands there were areas of stunning natural beauty. There were crystal springs, incredibly deep, and still a man could see clear through the earth beneath them.
There was beauty, there was danger. It was not a place for the faint of heart.
And the Seminoles added to the savage reputation of the American territory that Andy Jackson, along with so many others, had been determined to wrest from the Spanish. There had been a time when the Spanish had ceded the territory to the British, and during and after the American Revolution, British sympathizers had flocked south. Then the Floridas—East and West at the time—had gone back to Spain. Americans, being Americans, had kept wandering over the borders, forever reaching for new land. Spain, they claimed, could not control the territory, could not stop the Indians from raiding American farms and plantations, and could not stop them from harboring runaway slaves.
The slave issue was an explosive one. Escaped slaves readily headed south into Spanish territory that actually seemed to be ruled by the savages—but savages with a far gentler attitude where black men were concerned. It wasn’t that the Seminoles did not keep slaves themselves upon occasion; they did. And they could be as possessive of their property as white men when they chose. But there was a difference. Slaves might tend a Seminole master while still being free to cultivate their own plots of land. Slaves among the Seminoles were very often granted their freedom after a certain amount of service. Slaves who made it down to Florida very often found freedom, joining with free-black–Seminole bands. Whether blacks remained free or were “owned” by the Indians themselves, the Seminoles did not usually return them to white masters. In the Southern states, where the economy was so solidly based on farms and plantations, slaves were very valuable personal property.
