The Beloved Woman

by Deborah Smith

  The blood stopped in Katherine’s veins. She and Justis Gallatin shared a long, intense gaze, and regret slowly softened his features. “I’m sorry,” he said wearily.

  Her hands felt so icy, she curved them around the teacup for warmth. Gazing down into the amber liquid, she tried to think. She was not ordinarily given to nervous moods, but right now a bleak sense of doom was crawling through her stomach. “I want to go home,” she said softly. “Right now. I have missed my family for six years.”

  Rebecca made a strange noise. Katherine looked at her quickly, searching for answers. Delicate footsteps tapped on the porch, and Rebecca left the room hurriedly when someone knocked at the door.

  Katherine stood and faced Justis. “Please take me home.”

  He struggled for a second, then shook his head. “I can’t.”

  “Surely you understand my impatience to see my loved ones.”

  “Nope. I’ve got no loved ones. Never have had any.”

  “Oh, you’re being deliberately argumentative! Why not simply—”

  “Justis, my dear, you’ve finally found her. I’m so glad.”

  Katherine pivoted to find a petite young woman breezing into the parlor, voluminous pink skirts flouncing around her, her cheeks flushed just as pink, her eyes as hard as blue sapphires. A pile of beautiful red-gold hair was arranged in ringlets around her head, and her features were striking despite the thick pattern of freckles that covered most of her face.

  She went to Justis, took his hands, and looked up at him sweetly. “You were terribly kind to do it.”

  “Amarintha, wait,” Rebecca called frantically, following her.

  “This is the poor thing,” Amarintha cooed, turning to Katherine. “You brave dear.”

  Katherine’s mouth dropped open as the visitor threw both arms around her and hugged delicately, brushing a cool cheek against hers. When the woman stepped back her gaze swept over Katherine with intense appraisal. The pink mouth tightened. “And such a fine example of what civilization can do. It’s so very tragic.”

  Suddenly Justis inserted an arm between them. “Amarintha, let’s you and me step outside for a minute.”

  Katherine had had enough. “Stop it.” Her fists clenched, she backed away from the group, away from Rebecca’s strained expression, the newcomer’s rather melodramatic one, and the fierceness in Justis Gallatin’s eyes as he started toward her.

  “Someone tell me the truth,” she ordered.

  “You mean she doesn’t know?” Amarintha asked. “No one’s told her that her whole family’s dead?”

  Justis swung about and glared. “Dammit, you did that to be spiteful!”

  Katherine sagged against a chair, grasping its back. In a second Justis reached her. He latched on to her arms and held tightly, looking down at her in anguish.

  “This isn’t how I wanted to break it,” he said hoarsely. “But I reckon it’s as good a way as any.”

  She stared up at him and frowned in concentration. Whole family dead. No, of course not. “Where are they, really?” she asked.

  His fingers dug into her arms. “They were killed four days ago. All of ’em. We don’t know who did it. The farm was robbed and most everything was burned.”

  The words glanced off her, making sense but not penetrating her shield of disbelief. “But you don’t understand,” she murmured, and raised her hands to grip his dusty shirt. “My family tries very hard to fit in. Papa enlisted when Andrew Jackson asked Cherokees to help him fight the Creek Indians. He’s a veteran. My mother’s mother was a medicine woman and my mother was a Beloved Woman in the Blue clan. When the first missionaries came here, she convinced the people at the Talachee settlement to trust them. Don’t you see? No one would want to hurt my family.”

  “Katie gal,” he whispered, shaking her a little. “They’re dead. Believe me.”

  She pulled away from him and walked out of the parlor, out of the hotel, and across the side yard, where she stopped by the beech tree and wondered how she’d gotten there. Coming up the dusty trail past the hotel was a team of oxen pulling a large wagon filled with barrels. The two teamsters on the wagon seat gaped at her and pointed, then yelled something, she didn’t care what. She turned and stumbled blindly.

  “Easy, gal, easy,” Justis’s drawling voice said close to her ear, and his thickly muscled arm latched around her waist. She wasn’t certain whether she was walking or being carried, but she ended up behind the hotel in the midst of a flower garden.

  Her knees buckled but she didn’t fall. Instead, she was lowered to a sitting position among the flowers, and Justis sat beside her, holding her to his chest and stroking her shoulder.

  “There was no shaman to speak formulas over the bodies,” she whispered. “And no preacher to pray for them.”

  “Sam said the right things,” he assured her. “And we buried ’em proper.” His arms tightened around her. “Go ahead and cry. I’m so sorry, Katie.”

  After a minute passed and she only sat silent and stiff in his embrace, he drew back to look at her. Katherine gazed past him to the sunlight streaming into the hearts of the flowers, carrying power to them, to the earth, to everything that was strong and eternal.

  “They’re buried on the land?” she asked.

  “On the ridge beyond the house.”

  “Then they’ll always be part of it, and it’s part of me. And I’ll always have the land. I’ve dreamed it.”

  He didn’t say anything for a moment. Then, “You’ll never want for anything, Katie. Before I buried your pa, I promised him that I’d look after you. And I want to—it’s not just a duty.”

  What was he saying? Look after her? Why was it his concern? She was no child, and she didn’t need any help from a white man.

  She stared at him dry-eyed. “Take me home.”

  JUSTIS KNEW SHE wasn’t heartless, and he was relatively certain that she had a sound mind, but her reaction to her family’s death was the most puzzling thing he’d ever seen. She acted no more hysterical now than she had two hours before, in the garden.

  She sat on the wagon seat beside him, her bonnet in her lap, her expression blank. He knew Indians could be stone-faced when they wanted, but this was different. The Blue Song farm was nearly three hours from town—a long trip in a mule-drawn wagon over a rutted trail—but she’d been still as a statue the whole way.

  They turned onto the trail to the farm, but even that seemed to have no effect on her. The trail wound between steep hills covered in hardwood trees. As it neared the farm, clumps of purple irises and yellow jonquils dotted every sunny spot along the sides.

  Suddenly she laid a hand on his arm. “Stop, I want some flowers,” she said in a low, calm voice, and he felt as though a woodthrush had just murmured in his ear. “My mother planted these when I was little. My goodness, spring must have come late this year. I’m surprised that they’re still in bloom.”

  She climbed down before he could help her and spent the next ten minutes filling her arms with yellow and purple blossoms. Justis watched her in silent worry.

  She hardly knew what was happening, he thought.

  Back in the wagon again, she nuzzled her face against the flowers, then smiled. “Just as I’ve remembered them. It will be good to be home again.”

  “You’re gonna be all right,” he said gently. “You’re just a little confused in the head right now.”

  “No.” She gazed up the trail. It disappeared over a rise, and beyond were the first fields. “It’s all burned and broken, I know. The springhouse is the only thing that still stands.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “I see things in my mind sometimes, and they’re usually true.”

  He inhaled sharply. “You see anything else about the place, or what happened?”

  “No.”

  “Good.” This was not a line of conversation he wanted to pursue. When she offered no more words, he was relieved. The mules crested the hill and he pulled them to a stop.
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br />   This part of the land was too hilly for farming. Jesse and his field hands had cleared it for grazing, so it dipped and rose under a green carpet of grass, dotted by an occasional cluster of shade trees in the valleys.

  Dread grew inside Justis as the fields passed behind them and the forest closed in again. After a short distance it opened on the main clearing. A row of burned cabins bordered the road.

  “Papa freed his farmhands when he joined the church,” Katherine said casually, as if the cabins weren’t heaps of charred pine logs. “The families stayed on and worked for shares, though.”

  Justis noticed that her hands were digging into the flowers as she talked, crushing them. He patted her knee. “Your pa sent the hands away last year. North. He couldn’t protect ’em from kidnappers.”

  She wasn’t listening. Leaning forward, her body rigid, she gazed at the rubble of the main house and outbuildings. Her feet hit the ground before he stopped the wagon. Cursing under his breath, Justis followed her as she walked through the grounds, the flowers falling from her arms unheeded, scattering in a breeze that suddenly whipped over the ridge.

  He trailed her silently, waiting for her to do something, say something, to fall on the ground and sob like he expected a woman to do. She held her handsome gray skirt up and walked through the debris the raiders had spread in their hurry to find everything of value.

  Justis winced as she stopped here and there to pick up small items—a button, a broken ivory comb, the stem from a pipe—all of which she tucked into her purse. She halted under the oaks in the front yard, and he prayed that she wouldn’t notice the bloodstains beneath her feet.

  She didn’t seem to see anything around her, though. Her head was up, her eyes alert as if she were listening to voices he couldn’t hear, or talking silently to one of the Cherokee spirits. “Where are they buried?” she asked.

  “Over yonder, overlookin’ the valley.”

  The Blue Song land was beautiful, but the valley made it magnificent. Jesse had grown corn taller than a man’s head in those rich bottomlands. A meandering stream crossed the valley’s farthest edge, and hazy blue mountains rimmed the distant horizon.

  Justis had made certain that all five graves faced that heavenly view.

  He stood back and watched Katherine walk from one mound of red dirt to the next, her hands hanging motionless by her sides. What kind of grieving thoughts churned behind her mysterious eyes, he wondered. She took a bit of dirt from each grave and dropped it in her purse.

  “It’d do you good to cry,” he hinted.

  She stared blankly at the graves. “I’m hollow inside. There’s nothing there to make tears.”

  She walked toward the yard again, moving with short, unsteady steps. He sighed with relief. She was in shock, that was all. He’d never seen such a bad case of it before, but he knew it would pass eventually.

  She veered toward the small log structure a little way from the house. “I shall live here until the house is rebuilt,” she announced. After stumbling, she regained her composure and opened the door. Justis went over and stopped behind her, his mouth open in dismay. She was worse off than he’d figured.

  She stood in the doorway and surveyed the dark, cool interior, where the farm’s butter and eggs had been stored. A stone well stood at the center, unharmed.

  “I’ll sleep in the springhouse on a cot,” she said.

  Sorrow and determination boiled up inside Justis. He took her by the arm, slammed the door, and swung her to face him. Be merciful, he told himself. Make the cut clean and quick.

  “You’re not gonna live here, Katie. It’s not your home anymore.”

  “I was born here,” she explained patiently. “My mother was born here. Her father was a half-breed fur trapper. He settled on this land in 1797. The date’s carved on an old walnut tree over there.” She pointed. “See? The tree with the bench under it …”

  “The land’s been given away!” Justis yelled. He shook her hard, trying to break through her heart-wrenching blindness.

  Finally agony and panic showed in her eyes. Her voice rose. “I can buy it back!”

  “No, you don’t even have the right to do that! If you had all the money in the world you couldn’t buy it, or even lease it. The law says so!”

  “It’s mine. My family’s here.” She shook her head as she talked, breathing heavily, her hands clenched. “Who stole it and killed them?”

  “Nobody stole it,” he said between gritted teeth. “I don’t have an answer about the other. Gangs roam all over these hills, doing whatever they want to the Cherokees, and the state lets ’em. Come on, let’s get out of here. I’m not armed well enough to protect you if a gang was to wander up.”

  She looked as if she might bolt into the woods, and Justis suddenly wondered how he would ever get her back to town. He pulled her to him gently and wrapped his arms around her. She trembled and balled her fists against the center of his chest.

  “It’s because of this,” she said in fierce anguish, raising the gold nugget that hung there. “This poison is responsible for bringing every worthless white soul in the country here to murder innocent people.” She slung the nugget aside and dug her hands into his shirt. “Who stole this land?”

  “Let’s go back to town,” he said. He’d have to take her back by force if she didn’t cooperate. “I’ll tell you once we get there. Only when we get there. If you want to know who owns the land, you have to come with me.”

  The horror was taking its toll now, and she swayed against him. Finally she hung her head and said hoarsely, “Swear it.”

  “I swear.”

  Released by that vow, she fainted in his arms.

  CHAPTER 3

  KATHERINE woke with bright sunshine stinging her eyes. A hazy sense of despair and half-formed thoughts swam in her mind. It was easier to gaze around the room than to remember why she felt so hopeless.

  Starched white curtains swayed stiffly at an open window. The walls were papered rather than painted. The rich floral print made her dizzy, and she looked away. The room contained a tall dresser and a marble-topped washstand complete with a bowl, a pitcher, and colorful cotton towels. Rugs dotted the wooden floor.

  She lifted her covers and squinted at them groggily. Clean sheets and a pretty patchwork quilt. No bedbugs. The Gallatin-Kirkland Hotel provided lodgings that were far superior to most on the frontier.

  They’re dead. Papa, Mama, Anna, Elizabeth, even little Sallie.

  Katherine let the covers fall, and her hands dropped limply on top of them. Memories nearly smothered her—her mother’s walnut-brown eyes, warm with affection; her father’s way of laughing; her sisters’ merry pranks. The sound of footsteps made her jump. Feeling too weary to move, she managed to push herself into a sitting position against the ornately carved headboard.

  Her door opened and Justis Gallatin stepped into the room carrying a breakfast tray. Startled to find her staring at him, he halted. His sudden appearance jolted her senses. Like yesterday, he was dressed in a white shirt and dark trousers, but this morning he had tucked the trousers into knee-high boots.

  His skin was so weathered that had it been a little darker, he would have passed for part Cherokee, except that no Cherokee had ever had such wavy chestnut hair. His mustache made him look like the handsome villain in a play. The gold nugget gleamed on the light background of his shirt.

  Grief and anger fought within her, equally matched. She felt yesterday’s anguish settling into her bones with fresh, sharp agony. It would have to work its way to the surface before she knew who she was again. Katherine wanted to hate every white settler in north Georgia.

  “How do you feel?” Justis asked gently as he walked to a bedside table.

  Could she hate this dangerous man who’d befriended her?

  “Leave me alone. I don’t need your help. You’re trash, just a thieving settler no matter how kindly you act. Men such as you aren’t fit to set foot on Cherokee land. Not so many years ago we would
have burned you alive and laughed while you begged for mercy.”

  He stood beside the bed, looking miserable. “Katie, I know you hold it against me. Against every white man. If I thought it’d do a damned bit of good, I’d … All right, I will.”

  He set the tray down and went to her trunks and valises stacked neatly beside an armoire. Searching among them he found her doctor’s satchel and took the scalpel from it. He came back to her and laid it on the covers by her hand.

  Then he pulled his shirt off and sat on the edge of the bed with his broad, muscular back so close, she could see every hair, every freckle, the smallest workings of the flesh. “Go ahead,” he said gruffly. “There are plenty of scars there already. I don’t mind another one.”

  She stared at his back in horror. “I see them,” she whispered.

  “I’ve been in a lot of fights.” He waited for her to do or say something else. He never looked over his shoulder to see whether she’d picked up the knife.

  In the space of those few seconds she felt herself lose something deep and irretrievable from her soul. She began to cry silently because she knew she’d given it to the stranger who sat with his back bared to her, waiting stoically for her to hurt him.

  She choked on a sob and flung the scalpel to the floor. “I don’t hate you. Dear God, what are you trying to do to me?”

  His shoulders slumped. “I wish I knew, myself. I’m not prone to acting crazy.” Slowly he put his shirt back on. “Thank you, Katie.”

  Trembling violently, she pressed her hands to her forehead and tried to remember the evening before. As soon as he’d brought her back to the hotel he’d insisted that she drink some tea. Her recall ended with the soothing sound of his drawling voice. Shut those sad eyes and rest, gal. And it had been so easy to do that, especially when he slipped his arms under her and carried her here.

  Katherine leaned her head back, shut her eyes, and said dully. “You put something in the tea to make me sleep so that I wouldn’t question you anymore about my family or the farm.”