I spun underwater, thrashing, and I could feel the tug of the water carrying me away. I went plummeting downward in the water, and then I screamed in pain as the roots of my hair threatened to tear out of my scalp. Jeremy Bond pulled, dragging me back toward him by my hair, and I threw my arms out and reached back to seize that hand that was tearing my hair out. He took hold of my wrist and pulled me forward, on his knees in the water. For a moment we wrestled together as I struck out in blind panic. He finally slung an arm around my throat, caught both my wrists in his free hand, and lifted me, dragging me out of the water, half-strangling me as he did so.
Enormous hands reached out, clasping his arm, clasping mine, heaving, and I was vaguely aware of Dick Randolph swinging me over his shoulder. Rain pelted my back. The wind slammed at me with incredible force. The shrieking howl never ceased, the din so loud I thought my eardrums would burst from the agony of it. Randolph climbed, carrying me, Jeremy. Bond behind us, and then we were moving through the mouth of the cave. As Randolph set me on my feet, holding my arms so that I wouldn’t fall, I caught a quick glimpse of purple-gray rock walls and a blazing fire and a curious heap of mossy rugs and broken pots. I looked up into Randolph’s eyes and started to say thank you, and then my head started spinning and I collapsed in his arms.
“My God!” Em cried.
“She’s all right, gal. Just faint.”
“Bring her over here by the fire! She’s half-drowned!”
I was aware of strong arms moving me, lowering me onto grassy softness. I was aware of the dancing yellow-orange flames and the smoke and the heat and it was lovely, so lovely, for I was shivering and my teeth were chattering. I saw Em leaning over me with concerned hazel eyes, Corrie behind her, and I tried to sit up because I had to ask about Jeremy. Did he make it? Was he behind us? Em pushed me back onto the softness and then wrapped me up in something equally as soft. I shook my head because I couldn’t sleep, I had to know about Jeremy. I tried to speak again, and then I saw him standing beside the fire, peeling off the buckskin jacket.
I could hear the wind screaming and the rain lashing, but the sound was muted, not nearly as loud as the crackle of flames, lovely flames that danced merrily and cast flickering black shadows on the purple-gray walls and warmed me. I sighed, drawing the grassy softness closer about me, and I wondered what it was, wondered about the broken pots I had seen. I closed my eyes, sinking slowly into soft, luxurious darkness. When I opened them again I saw his face leaning over me, polished by firelight, eyes tender, brown hair dry, falling forward over his brow. I heard the wind and rain and heard him say something, and then darkness claimed me again as his hand touched my cheek and gently stroked it. I had rarely known such bliss.
Twenty-One
I struggled into a sitting position, dry, warm, surprisingly refreshed. The soft, sweet-smelling rug of dried, woven moss fell away from my shoulders as I stretched, looking around the cave. The fire had gone out, only a pile of cold, charred wood remaining, and rays of sunlight streamed through the opening. Corrie and the men were gone. Em smiled and came toward me with one of the curiously shaped white vessels.
“Here, luv,” she said, “drink this, it’s water, and try not to let the fact that cannibals drank out of it bother you.”
I took the vessel by its slender white neck and drank greedily, giving no thought whatsoever to other lips that might have touched the rim. The water was wonderfully cool and satisfying. Em watched me drink as a mother hen might watch an ailing chick. I finished the rest of the water and handed her the vessel. She set it down gingerly.
“How are you feeling?” she inquired.
“I’m sore all over. My jaw aches. My throat feels raw. The roots of my hair sting and, yes, my wrists hurt, too, but I feel wonderful, lucky to be alive.”
“You slept for hours, luv. It’s midafternoon now, and the storm passed over a long time ago.”
“Where are the men?”
“Hunting for food,” she replied. “Corrie went with them. It seems she knows quite a lot about roots and berries and things. They’ve been gone over an hour—should be back soon. I don’t know about you, but I’m starving.”
“I could use a bite,” I admitted.
“Randolph thinks he’s going to find game and kill it with a bow and arrow. As soon as the storm was over he went out and came back with a long willow branch and a bunch of sticks he’d cut. He peeled the bark off the sticks and notched them and sharpened the ends to points, making arrows, then took a piece of thin wire out of his pocket and fastened it to the willow branch and made a dandy bow.”
“Why go to all that trouble? Why not just use his gun?”
“That’s what I wanted to know, luv, thought it was silly as hell when he claims to be such a terrific shot. Know what he told me? He told me that if there still were any Karankawas lurking about the neighborhood he didn’t want to alert ’em of our presence with gunfire.”
“He thinks there might still be some around?”
Em nodded. “They’re migratory, he says, but it seems that when they migrate they don’t migrate far. They move all through the area in long canoes they make by hollowing out logs. They could be ten miles away or they could be half a mile away, and here’s the lovely part, luv, there isn’t just one big tribe of ’em. There’re bands of them all over the place.”
She shivered, folding her arms around her waist. I stretched again, not at all alarmed. The moss rugs made a soft, crackling sound. At least four of them were beneath me, making an unusually comfortable mattress.
“Some of them were in this cave,” Em continued. “They left the rugs and the pots. While you were sleeping Randolph told me all about them, told me a lot more than I cared to hear. He was trying to scare me, of course, and I’ll have to admit he did. They eat their victims alive, luv. They tie them to a stake and dance around them with knives and then nip over and cut off a piece of flesh and—”
“Please, Em,” I protested.
“And they cut their victim’s entrails out and roast them right in front of him. He had me cringing, all right. I was white as a sheet, actually trembling, and he put his arms around me and chuckled and told me not to worry, said he’d protect me, the bastard.”
“He was probably making most of it up, Em.”
“No he wasn’t, luv. He just confirmed the stories I heard on the island. After he’d finished scaring me he told me about their culture and habits and things. He seems to know all about them. The men are very tall and wear only breech-cloths and paint themselves up, usually in black and white. Each pattern they use on their bodies has a special meaning, a kind of message to the others. They tattoo themselves, too, like the Seminoles in Florida. I never heard of the Seminoles, but apparently the Karankawas have a lot in common with them, only the Seminoles don’t eat human flesh.”
She was determined to regale me with information, and I stood up, stretching once again. I was sore all over, it was true, but it seemed I could feel the life force quickening in my veins. I ignored the aches and pains, brushing bits of dried mud off my skirt.
“The women are quite attractive, he says,” Em continued. “They are tall, too, and wear skirts of dried moss, like those rugs, and strings of shells and green glass beads. The Karankawas are extremely promiscuous, Randolph says, and they have very close family tries. Some explorer named Cabeza de Vaca wrote about ’em in a book—Randolph read it, didn’t know he could read. This de Vaca fellow was shipwrecked off the coast in the early fifteen hundreds and wandered around the southwest for a couple of years, gathering information for his book, I suppose.”
Em warmed up to her subject, quite clearly fascinated, and I let her talk, paying very little attention. I continued to brush dried mud off my dress, my mind on Jeremy Bond.
“Anyway, luv, he found them quite friendly, de Vaca did. He called them Capoques and Hans instead of Karankawas, but Randolph says they’re the same Indians. They move around the lagoons and bays in their hollowed-out log ca
noes and catch fish in cane weirs and eat the root of an underwater plant when they can’t find anything else. This part’s going to bowl you over, luv—de Vaca recorded that the women nurse their young until the children are twelve years old! He was quite amazed.”
“I shouldn’t wonder,” I said, smiling.
Em sighed and shook her head and, momentarily forgetting the Karankawas, examined me with close scrutiny.
“You really had us worried, luv. I thought surely you were going to be killed.”
“So did I.”
“When I saw Jeremy Bond intended to tie you to a tree and leave you out there I screamed and kicked something awful, but Randolph wouldn’t put me down. He finally had to hit me, knocked me clean unconscious. I woke up in the cave just as Bond brought Corrie in. She was wailing, too.”
“There was nothing else he could do, Em. He was thinking of all of us. He saved my life.”
“Cocky chap. Can’t say that I take to him, although I’ll have to admit he’s terribly good-looking. Brave, too.”
“Extremely brave,” I said quietly.
“He squawked like the devil when I made him climb the tree, though. Said no dress on earth was worth climbing that high for. I put my hands on my hips and looked him straight in the eyes and told him if he didn’t get his ass up there I’d kick it so hard he wouldn’t sit on it for a week.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Your bundle, luv. You dropped it—don’t imagine you remember in all the excitement. It flew away and caught in the branches of one of the trees, and I saw it as soon as we stepped out of the cave. Your cocky gentleman shimmied up after it, grumbling all the way. Corrie and I dried everything over the fire. Your dresses and shoes weren’t wet, just the cloaks. Corrie’s things were only a little damp.”
“Were the brush and comb still there?”
Em nodded. “I’ve already used them, imagine you’d like to, too. I’ll get them.”
She handed me the brush and comb a moment later, and I combed the tangles out of my hair and then brushed until it fell to my shoulders in thick, smooth waves. This simple act made me feel much, much better somehow, and as I gave brush and comb back to Em I contemplated taking off my filthy dress and putting on one of the others. Reason told me it would be extremely foolish. We still had to trek to the boat they had left anchored in the secret cove, and a fresh dress would soon be as dirty as this one. I decided to wait until we reached the boat to change. I brushed the rest of the dried mud off my dress and then straightened the bodice, stepping over to the mouth of the cave to peer out at the storm-wracked terrain.
The damage wasn’t nearly as extensive as I would have imagined it to be. Limbs were torn off trees, true, and trees were split and broken, but the majority of them were undamaged, spreading leafy green limbs toward the radiant silvery-yellow sunshine. The torrents of water were gone, of course, and the ground was already dry. Overhead the sky stretched blue-white and cloudless, polished with sunlight, and from this elevation I could see a network of swollen rivers and lagoons, half-concealed by willows and the sturdy gray cypress. It was hard to believe that only a few hours ago all this had been obliterated by torrential rains and raging winds that crushed and destroyed.
“Incredible, isn’t it?” Em said, coming to stand beside me. “It’s all so peaceful and calm now. Pretty, too, if you like scenery. Never could get too excited about it myself.”
“It’s wonderful to be free, isn’t it?”
“If you don’t mind cannibals lurking behind every tree. Me, I’ll be much happier once we’re in New Orleans.”
“At least we’re off the island, Em.”
“And have two strapping men to protect us. I feel terribly secure with that Randolph around. He gives me a cozy, cuddly feeling inside—I want to snuggle up and purr, and at the same time I want to scratch.”
I gave her a wry look, arching one eyebrow.
“Oh no, luv,” she protested, “this time it’s serious.”
I merely smiled and shook my head, savoring the brilliant sunlight that stroked my cheeks and bare arms and shoulders. It was very warm, although the heat lacked the sultry, oppressive quality it had had earlier. I felt a marvelous energy surging through me, and there was a light, lovely, tremulous sensation I hardly recognized—it had been so long since I felt it. I realized that I was happy. For the first time in months and months I felt relaxed and radiant, smiling naturally, easily, at peace with myself and the world. I didn’t care to examine the reasons.
“Here they come,” Em said. “Lord, he’s got two huge birds in his hand! Holding them by their feet.”
“Wild turkeys,” I told her.
“Just look at that satisfied look on his face. Mighty pleased with himself.”
Randolph saw us standing in front of the cave and lifted the turkeys over his head, waving them triumphantly. Em made a disgusted noise. Randolph came on up the hill, Jeremy and Corrie behind him. Corrie was carrying a basket of woven willow that must have been in the cave along with the other things. It was filled with plump, purple-black berries. Jeremy took her elbow, guiding her past a large boulder. He climbed the rest of the way with that long, easy stride, loose and bouncy. The fringe on his jacket swayed, and I noticed that the red-orange bandana was back around his neck, none the worse for wear.
“Success!” Randolph cried. “Look at ’em! Aren’t they lovely?”
“Get those bloody things away from me!” Em snapped.
“Got ’em both with my bow and arrow, and you thought I was going to come back empty-handed, didn’t you?”
“I was hoping you wouldn’t come back at all,” she said dryly.
“Joshin’ again. Bet you pined for me the whole time. Corrie here found a blackberry bush, filled the basket with ’em, and Jeremy-boy spent the whole time sittin’ with a fishin’ pole. Nary a nibble.”
“Don’t rub it in,” Jeremy grumbled. “They just weren’t biting. Never could abide fishing. Bores the bejesus out of me.”
“You just don’t have the knack, lad. It’s an art.”
“Glad to see you up and about,” Jeremy told me.
“I feel wonderful.”
“Can’t say the same about myself. Skinned my knees climbing that bloody tree to fetch your bundle. Hurt my hands, too.”
“Poor baby,” Em said.
“You shut up!”
“Isn’t he adorable? I love a man with a sunny disposition. What do you intend to do with those birds, Randolph?”
“I intend to cut their heads off, and then you’re going to pluck out all the feathers and we’re going to make a spit and roast ’em.”
“I’m not going to pluck them,” she retorted, recoiling with horror. “I’m not going to touch them! Gives me the shivers just to think of it.”
Randolph grinned and took out his knife, and Em scurried back into the cave so she wouldn’t have to witness the decapitations. I sat down on a rock, took one of the turkeys, and deftly began to pluck the feathers. Corrie took the berries inside, and Randolph followed her in order to tease Em some more. Jeremy stood with his hands on his hips, head cocked to one side as he watched me pull the feathers out.
“You do that quite well,” he remarked.
“I’ve had lots of experience.”
“Oh?”
“I’ve plucked many a chicken in my time, usually dipped them in boiling water first. It makes the feathers come out more easily. Here, this one’s done. Hand me the other.”
“It seems you have talents I never suspected,” he said, handing me the other turkey. “You mean you can actually cook?”
“I’m a superb cook,” I retorted.
“I don’t believe it!”
I plucked out a handful of feathers and dropped them on the ground, not bothering to look up at him. “I make a peach pie that melts in your mouth,” I informed him, “and you haven’t lived until you’ve tasted my pot roast. I use special herbs to give it just the right flavor.”
“You jest, lass. No woman who looks like you could possibly find her way around a kitchen. Next you’ll be telling me you polish boots.”
“I’ve polished my share.”
“Wanna polish mine?”
“Here. This one’s done, too. If you’ll hand me your knife, I’ll cut them open and remove the entrails.”
“I don’t think I want to watch.”
“You’re as bad as Em,” I told him.
I took the knife from him and took the turkeys and moved down the hill a little way to perform the task. After I had finished, I wiped my hands off in the grass and returned to the cave with the turkeys ready to be roasted. Em gave a horrified look as I handed them to Randolph, who had already set up a crude spit over the remains of the fire, driving two Y-shaped sticks into the ground on either side. He skewered the turkeys on a third stick and placed it on top of the other two.
“There!” he proclaimed. “Now all we need is a fire, and in a little while we’ll be eating like kings. Any more wood over there in the corner? Fetch it for me, saucy, and stay away from those blackberries! You’ll spoil your appetite.”
“Bossy brute, aren’t you?”
There was some water left in one of the vessels. I rinsed my hands off and then asked Corrie if she would like to take a walk while the turkeys were cooking. She shook her head and smiled and told me she’d had quite enough exercise for one afternoon, I squeezed her shoulder and strolled out of the cave, moving leisurely down the hillside. A moment later I heard Jeremy Bond clumping down after me. I didn’t turn around, ignoring him even after he caught up and strode along beside me. The light, lovely feeling seemed to dance in my blood, and I felt gloriously alive.
“Don’t mind me,” he said, “I just thought I’d keep you company.”
“You needn’t have bothered.”
“Wouldn’t want you to stumble into a band of Karankawas, lass. The area is swarming with them. Randolph and I found two hollowed-out canoes down by the river, half-hidden under some shrubs. The men who left ’em there might be coming back for ’em.”
Love Me, Marietta Page 36
