Phetna smiled at him. “Seems like there’s been some times when she ain’t said some of the things she should of.” She looked pointedly at Miranda.
Linnet was embarrassed and changed the subject. “Devon, when are you going to make the doll head for Miranda? You seem to have enough strength now.”
He gave her a look that made her hurriedly look down at her apron full of string beans. “Soon’s you take me to get a piece of wood.”
“You’ll have to tell me what to get, and I’ll find something for you.”
“Huh! You’d probably bring back a chunk of oak or a piece of dried hickory.”
Linnet didn’t understand what would be wrong with either item and her consternation showed.
“See,” he said to Phetna, then turned back to Linnet. “I’m so sick of bein’ inside, I’m gonna start carvin’ the walls—with my teeth! Why don’t we go outside for a while?”
“Now? But we can’t.”
“Why not?”
“Your feet, they’re still raw, and I have to cook and—”
“You two just go on,” Phetna said. “Me and Miranda’ll take care of what needs doin’ here.”
Linnet opened her mouth to protest.
“Why, Lynna, you look like you’re scared to be alone with me,” Devon said, a smirk in his voice. “What can I do when I’m so helpless?”
Linnet refused to blush again. “Of course we can go. I’m not afraid of you in the least, Devon Macalister.”
They walked together, Devon slowly and painfully to the front porch, where he picked up the little hand saw. He paused and touched the hair at her temple. “Nor am I afraid of you, Linnet…Macalister.”
She walked past him but she smiled when her back was to him.
“Wait a minute,” he said. “I can’t go so fast.”
She turned and saw the pain on his face as he tried to walk on his burned feet. She took his arm, and he used her for support. “Devon, you shouldn’t have come outside, shouldn’t have tried to walk yet.”
He smiled down at her, a bit crookedly but a smile just the same. “A spring day spent outside with the pretty woman I love will help me more than anythin’ else. You wouldn’t begrudge me that pleasure, would you?”
She touched his shoulder with the top of her head. “No, Devon, I can’t deny you anything.”
“Oh, no! This may prove to be a very pleasant day.”
“Stop it right now or I’ll push you down onto your sore back.”
“My back? I remember a night I spent on my back while a little English girl—”
“Devon!”
He laughed but said no more. When they finally reached the patch of clover, Devon sat down gratefully, and Linnet removed his moccasins and saw that his feet had cracked and bled in several places. The sight brought tears to her eyes.
“Come here, you silly girl and stop lookin’ like that. Now go over to that poplar tree and saw me off a branch.”
It was not easy getting a piece of wood to Devon’s exact specifications, and she began to see the artist side of him and the amount of time and thought he put into one of his carvings.
“Mind you, this is gonna be pretty crude since I don’t have my carvin’ tools here.”
She lifted her eyebrows but said nothing as she sat down beside him. It was good just to see him well and moving about.
When the wood was in his hands, he took out his knife and began to carve and talk. “I had a long time to think while I was layin’ there, Lynna, and I thought about all the things you said to me the mornin’ of the fire.”
“Devon, I—”
“Don’t stop me. You had your say, and now I get mine. In my whole life I never treated nobody like I treated you, and I’m sorry, for more reasons’n one. I guess I’ve always had strong feelin’s for you, else I wouldn’ta taken on Spotted Wolf. I just knew I couldn’t let somebody die who worried about other people like you done when your own life was about to end. I can’t say I was in love with you but I sure felt somethin’. Then when you washed up so pretty, I guess I felt like you betrayed me. Maybe I felt kinda noble rescuin’ that ugly little thing, but then when you wasn’t ugly, I felt like you’d laughed at me. I guess I can’t say what I feel so good.”
“Your Thomas Jefferson couldn’t do so well.”
Devon gave her a puzzled blink, having never heard of Jefferson. “Well, I guess that means you understand me. I’m…real sorry for what I done to you. I know it can’t help matters much now, not after you sayin’ you could never have any feelin’ for me again, but I want you to know I am sorry, and I want you to be real happy with your Squire.”
“My—!” she began, then stopped and started again, her voice sad. “I’m sure I will be, since he is a fighter.”
“A fighter!” Devon stopped carving. “He wouldn’t know how to fight a four-year-old. He’s lived soft all his life.”
“And you haven’t? Haven’t you always had everything you’ve ever wanted in your life?”
“Damn you! How can you say that when the woman I want more than anythin’ else wants somebody else?”
“Of course you’ve never asked her to marry you, have you? You may have said you’d marry her when you found out she had borne your child, but you’ve not asked her since she’s had time to think and realize that she can’t seem to stop herself from loving you.”
Linnet’s eyes twinkled as she watched Devon. At first he stared unbelievingly, and then when he began to understand her words, he relaxed and gave her a slow smile. “Then you think maybe if I asked her now, she might consider marryin’ me?”
“I dare say she would consider the proposal seriously.”
He smiled wider at her. “Then where are my moccasins?”
She frowned in puzzlement. “They’re behind you, but you don’t need them now.”
“I sure do,” he said as he turned and picked one up. “I got to go ask Phetna to marry me. I never dreamed that she’d accept, but now that you’ve opened my eyes, I—”
“Phetna,” Linnet exclaimed. “Phetna!” She was incredulous but before she could say another word, Devon lunged at her and pulled her to him, crushing her against his chest. “Devon,” she managed to gasp.
He loosened his hold on her, but not much. “Lynna, will you marry me and live with me and spend every night with me?”
She pushed away from him and looked up into his happy, sparkling blue eyes. “What kind of proposal is this? Spend every night with you? No gentleman would ever mention such a thing as…as night time activities to a lady.”
He was very serious and slightly puzzled. “I ain’t no gentleman and it’s been a long time.”
She laughed, her face against his smooth, bare chest. “I would rather have your honesty than all the sweet-smelling, lace-attired gentlemen in the world. I hope you always desire me, Devon.”
He pulled her head back, tired of talk, and kissed her sweet, eager mouth, both of them totally unaware of the two men who watched them from the woods.
It took Linnet a while to make Devon understand that she wanted her wedding night to be more than a quick tumble in some clover, and although he did point out they’d already had one wedding night, nevertheless, he did let her win the argument. It was two very happy, laughing people who returned to Linnet’s cabin, but the sights and sounds inside the cabin broke their joyous mood.
Chapter Twenty
MIRANDA WAS SCREAMING, HER LITTLE BODY covered in great globs of mud, and when she saw her mother, she kicked against Nettie to be released and ran to Linnet. Linnet soothed her and began trembling herself when she felt her child’s fear.
“What’s been goin’ on here?” Devon demanded angrily.
“They started,” Nettie said. “Them young’uns threw mud at Phetna and the baby, callin’ ’em witches.” She leaned over and dabbed at the blood that ran down Phetna’s face from a gash on the side of her forehead.
Devon went to kneel by the woman and took the cloth from Nettie. “
Looks like more’n mud to me.” Phetna sat quietly while Devon tended to her wound.
Gradually, Linnet calmed Miranda, and the cabin was quiet. Phetna turned her hideous, mutilated face to Devon, her eyes bright with tears. “You woulda been my boy,” she said quietly.
He looked at her a moment, then grinned and returned to cleaning her wound. “It’s a good thing you weren’t my ma ’cause I got a feelin’ you woulda tanned my hide ever’ time I needed it, and if you’d done that, I still wouldn’t be able to sit down.”
Phetna laughed her high, shrill cackle. “I guess it was a good thing then.”
It was hours before the cabin returned to order. Nettie went home, and so Devon helped Linnet bathe Miranda, and the child took advantage of her father’s inexperience and managed to drench both him and half the cabin. The wound on Phetna’s head had to be sewn, and she would allow no one but Devon to do it. Exhausted, Phetna and Miranda finally fell asleep.
Sometime in the night Linnet heard Devon slowly make his way outside. When he didn’t return right away, she went to find him and saw that he sat on the edge of the porch, his head in his hands.
She tried to keep her voice light. “It seems you’ve conquered three females today.”
He ignored her jest. “Somethin’s gotta be done, Linnet. There’s too many of ’em, and I’m too weak to fight ’em alone.”
She sat beside him. “You’re not alone, I’m here.”
He looked at her in the moonlight. “You’ve had to fight too many battles already. For once you’re gonna have somebody take care of you. We’re gonna leave this place. Tomorrow we’re goin’ home.”
“Home,” Linnet said quietly. “Sweetbriar.”
“Yes, we’re goin’ home to Sweetbriar and we’re takin’ Phetna with us. That suit you?”
She felt so good, warm and happy. “Perfectly. That suits me perfectly.”
“Now get back inside ’fore I forget you’re my intended and all them stupid reasons you give me this afternoon for not makin’ love to you and I take you right here on the front porch.”
She hesitated but then stood and went inside. At the door she looked back but he was already deep in thought again.
The Squire poured another drink, his hand shaking uncontrollably. It seemed that there was nothing in his line of vision but colors: red, orange, yellow, figures of black. The little bitch had made him the brunt of a joke. Everyone was laughing at him!
He turned and looked at the Indian man tied and thrown in a corner of his cabin. So, she thought the Squire was something to joke about with her lover, did she? Just how did he earn the title, yes title, of the Squire if he were such a weak object?
He refilled his pewter mug. The whiskey no longer burned his throat. In fact, he seemed almost immune to its effects except that his anger grew more and more strong. He remembered Boston and saving her. Where would she be now if it hadn’t been for him? And what had she ever done to thank him properly?
He remembered the way she kissed Macalister, not just with her lips but with her whole body. He slammed the mug down. Well, by God, she was going to kiss him like that someday. He turned to the Indian and saw the black eyes burning with hatred, and the idea of someone else feeling the same emotion as he felt made him smile.
What had that Indian been doing, spying on the young white couple? Was he perhaps just wanting to watch what seemed likely to happen? But it must have been more since the Indian’s concentration had been so intense that he’d not even heard the Squire’s rather heavy footsteps behind him, hadn’t heard the whistle of the gun handle as the Squire brought it down on the Indian’s head.
He lifted the mug in salute to the Indian. “What were you wanting out there, boy? You don’t look like one of those young bucks that have to steal to prove they’re men. No, there’s something else on your mind.” He drained the last of the whiskey. “I can tell you I have other things on my mind. First of all, there’s a woman I’d like to pay back in kind. I’d like to give her some of what she’s given me. It doesn’t make one feel like a man to be used by a woman.
“Rattlesnakes! That’s what all women are. They lie and use you, take forever. Well, this one,” he tried to get more whiskey from the empty bottle, “this one ain’t gonna win.” He was unaware that he had slipped into the Kentucky slur. “No siree bob, this one ain’t gonna win. She’s gonna repay me for all I done for her and she ain’t gonna laugh at me no more. All I gotta do is get Macalister outta the way.”
Even drunk, he saw the way the Indian’s eyes lit at the name. He considered this knowledge for a moment. “So, you know Macalister, do you? That figures, him bein’ an Injun an’ all. You talk English, Injun?”
The tied and gagged man nodded curtly.
“Where will it all end? Injuns what speak English. Next the government’ll set up schools and teach the animals to read and write. I’m gonna take that gag off you, boy, but you try doin’ anythin’ and I’ll happily kick your teeth and most of your face down your throat.”
He untied the man’s gag. “Now, what’s your name?”
“Crazy Bear,” the Indian said.
“All right, Crazy Bear, you and me are gonna have a long talk.”
When Linnet woke, the first thing she saw was Devon’s empty bed. She sighed. She had liked it better when he was immobile, before he had walked with her to the clover patch, before he had gone to sit on the porch last night. She put her hands behind her head and stared at the ceiling. Phetna and Miranda still slept, the horrible events of the evening before causing their exhaustion.
Today, she thought, today they would all leave this ugly town. Devon would take them back to Sweetbriar. Nettie was her only regret at leaving Spring Lick, but then there were so many friends at home, just thinking of them made her feel good.
“Where’s the boy?”
Linnet looked across to Phetna stretched out on another borrowed mattress on the floor. “I don’t know. Now that you’ve given him the moccasins, I’m afraid he’ll be walking everywhere.” She tried not to let her resentment seep into her voice but did not wholly succeed.
Phetna smiled. “You better learn now you can’t keep a Macalister in some bottle just waitin’ for you to give him leave to go where he wants.”
“I guess not.” She smiled back. “It’s just that I’ve grown used to knowing where he is. Last night he sat on the porch for hours, worrying. At least I guess it was hours. I never heard him return.”
Phetna sat up. “That’s a man’s duty in life, takin’ care of his womenfolk. Now I got to get up and start cookin’ us somethin’ to eat.”
Linnet smiled dreamily. “We can’t cook too much because we are going home today.” She didn’t see Phetna’s bleak expression.
“You all goin’ back to Sweetbriar?”
Linnet turned onto her stomach and looked up at Phetna. “We are going, all of us. Devon especially said he wanted you to go with us.”
Phetna sat down on the bench. “He don’t want an old woman like me.”
Linnet stood and began folding the quilt. “Devon knows exactly what he wants, and we don’t have time to argue with him because we have a lot of packing to do.”
Phetna seemed to realize what Linnet was saying. “I don’t guess I ever wanted to go anywheres worse’n I wanta go to Sweetbriar. I got things at my cabin I need to gather up.”
“Of course,” Linnet said. “There’s very little to do here really, so Miranda and Devon can help me. Why don’t you go and pack and we’ll meet you there as soon as you’re ready?”
Phetna made an expression that looked like a grin. “I’m just gonna do that. You don’t need me here?”
“No, the sooner everything, both here and at your cabin is done, the sooner we can leave.”
“I’m for that.” Before Linnet could blink, Phetna was out of the cabin door and Linnet knew exactly how the woman felt, because she felt the same way.
Linnet knew Devon needed time alone, which he hadn’t had for n
early a week, and she also knew how much he hated being kept indoors for so long, but when he hadn’t returned by noon, she began to worry. She went to the woods, calmly walking around, expecting any moment to find him asleep under a tree. She planned the scolding she would give him and she thought how he’d pull her into his arms and wouldn’t let her talk anymore.
When she returned to the cabin she was further alarmed to see he had not returned. Absentmindedly, she gave Miranda her dinner, Linnet too nervous to eat. The few things she and her daughter owned were packed. She refused to take anything that was not essential.
When a knock sounded, she opened the door to the Squire and they stood staring at one another for a moment. He looked over her head to the neat bundles on the floor and pushed past her into the little cabin.
“So, you’re leaving.”
“Yes,” she said, all at once realizing that she had totally forgotten him.
“I take it you had no intention of even letting me know of your plans.”
“I…” She put her chin in the air and met his eyes. “My conduct has been unforgivable and I apologize. It seems that everything has happened so quickly that I haven’t had time to think.”
“Huh!” he snorted. “I guess you mean about your old lover comin’ back into your life and sweeping you off your feet again. You know, I pity you young girls. No matter what a man does to you, if you have the idea you love him, you’ll keep on believing in him no matter what else he does to you.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“You don’t? Well, look about you. You’re all packed and ready to go, yet where’s your young swain?” He smiled when she didn’t answer. “You see, Linnet, just as he left you once, so he’s done it again. He had no intention of marrying you. Why should he? Why should he saddle himself with a wife and child when the whole world’s at his feet? He’s young, good-looking and the women like him, so why should he give up something like that?”
“I don’t want to hear any more of this. Would you please leave?”
He sat down on the bench in front of the table and leaned back. “You’re throwing me out of my own cabin? Might I remind you that everything you supposedly own is mine? I even paid for Miranda’s birth.” His eyes turned cold. “Now that he’s gone and left you, just what do you plan to do? You gonna follow him back to Sweetbriar? Chase him like the common woman you’ve become?”
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