Wind Song

by Bonds, Parris Afton

  “I only wanted to—”

  Miss Halliburton began to quake visibly. Her face became as ashen as her pewter gray wig. Her voice was a mere rasp. “Is this—is this,” she asked, pointing to the rawhide bag of cedar dust, “what I think it is?”

  Abbie lost all patience. “I don’t know what you think it is, Miss Halliburton.”

  The principal folded her arms and jutted her head forward. “Am I correct in assuming that this is a peyote ceremonial bag?”

  Abbie could see the trouble coming. Clearly the new year was going to be a disastrous one. “Yes.”

  “Peyote!” It was a roar now. “By all that’s holy, Mrs. Dennis! Next you’ll even have the peyote buds on display here for the children. Children! How could you?”

  There was no point in backing down now. “I did think about displaying peyote buds. But I didn’t know where to find them, Miss Halliburton.”

  The principal clapped her hand across her forehead and leaned against the display table. After a moment she said in a deadly quiet voice, “Get rid of this—this trash, immediately.” She turned to leave, then said, “And, Mrs. Dennis, I can assure you that this will go on your record at the BIA headquarters.”

  “There’s no hope of redeeming myself now,” Abbie lamented. “That last fiasco with the peyote artifacts really set Miss Halliburton off on a rampage.”

  Marshall dumped a packet of powdered cream into his coffee. He had gotten into the comfortable habit of having coffee with her in the teacher’s lounge every week when he came by for the teachers’ order forms. “I’ll look into the matter, Abbie. But I can’t promise much, since headquarters has jurisdiction over my agency.”

  She bit her bottom lip. “Marshall . . .” Her voice was almost inaudible. “I can’t fail here. I have nowhere else left to go.”

  His hand covered hers. “You know that you have a place with me. No, I mean it. In every sense of the word. I would ask you to marry me today—except I know that marriage is the last thing you want now.”

  Why couldn’t Cody be that understanding? She managed a small smile and squeezed his strong fingers. “Your offer tempts me. I know I would find a warm, comfortable life with you. But I won’t find Abbie Dennis. If I find her anywhere, it will be here at Kaibeto.”

  No, neither marriage nor men were for her. So why was it that her thoughts continually turned to Cody? She told herself that it was pointless to see him again, but found herself looking for him every time she went to the trading post.

  Even when she closed her eyes at night, in the dark silence of her bedroom, she saw him—the powerful features of his face; the firm, hard curve of his buttocks. She tasted once more his salty flesh, she felt the wiry hair that snaked from his navel downward and she smelled all over again that scent that was uniquely him and affected her like an aphrodisiac.

  Thus it was like a blow to her stomach when Linda McNabb, her green eyes wide with awe, showed her the Phoenix Gazette toward the end of January. She, Linda, Dorothy and Becky were all relaxing at recess in the teacher’s lounge.

  Linda flipped down the pages of the society section to locate the article. “There,” she said, poking at the photo of a young woman with a gamin haircut and large, heavily fringed eyes behind fashionable rimless glasses. While she wasn't really pretty, there was something very seductive about her. But it was the man standing next to her in the photo whom Linda was pointing at. “Isn’t that the Indian artist who lives here at Kaibeto?"

  ARIZONA AUTHORESS IN PHOENIX FOR MOVIE PREMIERE. Abbie skipped over the headline to read the text.

  Emily DuMonde, who achieved instant success with her first novel, Ashes of the Phoenix, is here for Friday night’s gala premiere of its screen adaptation. Escorting her is Arizona’s renowned jewelry craftsman, Cody Strawhand. Both are alumni of Arizona State University.

  Becky leaned over Abbie’s shoulder. “Holy Moses, but ain’t he a stud!”

  “Becky!” Dorothy reproved, but she leaned closer to get a better look at the photo.

  Cody, towering over the authoress, looked very elegant in a black tuxedo that made his collar- length hair seem almost as dark. Yet even with his sophisticated clothing there was still something in his expression that warned that he was not one of civilization’s tame animals.

  Briskly Abbie folded the newspaper and handed it back to Linda. “Studs are a dime a dozen these days, Becky. You’re worldly wise enough to know that.”

  “If they were a dime a dozen, you can bet I wouldn’t be teaching in this prison!”

  * * * * *

  The man, one of the last of a wild breed, looked over the assembly gathered before him. Dignitaries, the state’s most powerful businessmen, the press.

  All had come to do him homage. A cynical smile curved his lips.

  Abbie bent the page’s corner and slapped the book down on the nightstand. So Emily DuMonde could write. Write well. So what? She flicked off the lamp. She had better things to do with her time than stay up until three in the morning reading. Things like sleeping.

  She punched her pillow and turned on her left side—and went rigid as she heard the front door knob grate, as if someone were twisting it. It was a shock because she had come to learn that Indians simply didn’t steal on the reservation. At least, not sober Indians. But the muffled shout of “Open the door!” told her that this was a drunk Indian. Cody.

  The peau de soie nightgown swished about her ankles as she made her way to the living room. She switched on the front porch light and looked out the strip of window that ran from floor to ceiling, the one concession to architectural lightness in the subsidized apartment developments. Cody stood there, his plaid shirt unbuttoned to his concho-belt. He held a fifth of scotch. Above his hollowed cheeks his dark eyes were piercing. “Open up, Abbie, or I’ll open the door for you.”

  “You’ll wake the neighbors,” she said as loudly as she dared. “Go away.”

  “If you don’t open it, I’ll wake every teacher in the apartments. Do you want that?”

  She bit her lower lip. “All right,” she said, opening the door. “But you can only stay a minute.”

  His hand locked on the one with which she still clasped the doorknob. He loomed over her, his eyes glittering in the darkness. His warm breath fanned her face, and the faint scent of whiskey enveloped her, intoxicating her. He pushed the door closed and backed her against it. Nervously she pushed away the hair that had fallen over one temple. “What do you want?” she asked, shamming a poise that had deserted her the minute he touched her.

  His eyes narrowed. “What do I want? How can you ask that? I want you. I want you any way I can have you, any position, anytime.”

  As if fixated, she stood trembling. His hands came up to cup her bare shoulders. “You tell me you don’t want a commitment,” he said in a voice that rasped with whiskey and raw wanting. He shrugged. “But you want me. And I’m here to see that you don’t go without.”

  Her heart pounded in her ears like a pneumatic drill. “Not like this,” she whispered. “Not coming like a thief in the night . . . not—”

  His mouth crushed down on hers, and her hands came up to push against his chest. “Don’t!” he mumbled against her lips, and subjugated her mouth with his again.

  Resisting his strength was pointless anyway. She remained standing passively within the shackle of his arms. Or tried to. But the narcotic smell of the alcohol on his breath, his tongue mating with her tongue, his lips molded against hers— they all had their effect in weakening her resistance. His hands moved down to cup her buttocks and grind her against him. While he was still kissing her, his fingers worked the slinky nightgown up to her hips and slipped beneath her panties to sensuously knead her flesh.

  She angled her chin to better answer his kiss. She could hear herself breathing hard and hated her weakness. Yet her hands, caught against his chest, slid inside the open shirt and searched to find the tiny nipples hidden within the nests of curling hair. Her fingernails flicked them
to a button hardness.

  He groaned. “I’m going to make love to you, Abbie.”

  She twisted her mouth free from the domination of his kiss. “No!”

  He easily scooped her up against him. “Which way is your bed?”

  “Cody, I won’t let you do this.”

  He started walking. “Why not? You admit you want me.”

  She gasped, but his kiss quieted her protests. His knee found the bed, and he unceremoniously dropped her on the mattress. He stripped his shirt away and kicked off his boots and jeans. She should have moved, but the dim blur of his powerful body transfixed her.

  As if he possessed the night vision of a cat, he unerringly reached across the bed to grab one of her ankles and pulled her to the bed’s center. “You wouldn’t!” she whispered.

  He laughed. “I shouldn’t.”

  Why was she fighting him when she did want him? Slowly, while he watched, her hands inched her lacy bikinis down over legs that she had just that night shaved and lavished with scented cream —for him?

  When the bikinis dropped to the floor, his hands captured her ankles and spread them wide. Sinuously he slid up over her thighs and stomach, like a giant python that would crush her within its embrace. He caught her hands and anchored them above her against the headboard. “Abbie . . . Abbie . . . your name plays over and over in my brain like some shaman’s ritualistic litany.”

  To her he was a shaman—a shaman who had spread his magical medicine like a net over her, a net she tried one last time to resist. “Cody, please—let me think. People just don’t—”

  Gently he kissed each eyelid and pushed the hair off her forehead. “Abbie ... I wouldn’t ever want to hurt you.”

  She should have been furious, but her imprisoned position only excited her. Above her his eyes glowed with the same arousal that coursed through her. She tilted her chin, offering him her lips. “Cody ...”

  “The sound of your name on my lips is enough.” He took her then with the same fierceness of that first kiss the day of the flash flood. And as he finally poured into her the powerful essence of his life force, he growled, “You’re physically mine, Abbie . . . and one day I’ll claim your for mine completely.

  * * * * *

  Her hand groped in the dark on the nightstand for a package of cigarettes. And then she remembered again that she had given up smoking. Shit!

  She rose up on one elbow and tried to read the digital clock. Almost six. How long had she drifted in that world of semisleep? Beside her Cody’s breathing was even. One of his heavymuscled thighs anchored her calf to the mattress. Her gaze strayed to the fork of his legs, and she had the urge to stroke that cylindrical length of coppery flesh, to bring him once again to the state of blinding excitement in which they had met so often during the night.

  She was becoming quite the warrioress, displaying aggressive love- making that seemed in no way to threaten him. At his urging she had become the aggressor, rising above him to take him within her and lead him with her on her wild, exultant ride until she collapsed, her hair tumbling across his face and shoulders. Afterward, he had stroked her hair, whispering words of praise for his warrioress.

  He had talked later—in his sleep—and tossed, pushing the sheets from his sweat-soaked body. He had mumbled about a suicide—a showerhead —Indian children caught between two worlds. And she knew what for her was a tragedy was for him a living nightmare.

  She knew that she was falling in love with him. He wasn’t an ordinary man. He was stimulating to be with. The quiet, forceful way he spoke, the intent way he listened, the thorough way he made love—gentle yet resourceful. Why couldn’t they have met years ago? He was a man whom she wanted to be with, . . . but could she tie herself to him forever?

  Careful not to shift the mattress, she blindly felt about on the floor for her gown and retrieved it.

  Stealthily she edged her leg from beneath his. But when she went to rise, his hand entwined in her long hair, forcing her head back.

  “You’re still running away, aren’t you?”

  “I’ve got to get ready for school.”

  He released her hair and rolled to a sitting position, his arm propped on one crooked knee. “You know what I mean, Abbie.”

  She sprang from the bed, the gown held protectively in front of her. “What do you want from me?” she asked. He said nothing but regarded her with such a piercing look that she cried out, “I can’t, Cody! Don’t you understand? I’m not Spartan like you. I can’t be content with – ”

  “—living like an Indian?” he sneered.

  “I want more from life than you do.”

  “You’re a coward.”

  “No more than you. At least I don’t hide out from the world. Walking on the perimeters of society, afraid to get involved. At least I’m trying to find my place.”

  “And what is your place? Are you nothing but a pretentious socialite who takes but cannot give?”

  “Damn it!” she cried. “That’s all I’ve done is give, give and give and give.” Her fists clenched at her sides; the gown slithered down about her ankles. Tears spiked her lashes. “It’s my turn now!”

  “Giving and taking can’t be done by turns.”

  “You ought to know—I’d be willing to bet that Emily DuMonde does a lot of giving.”

  He arched one brow. His smile when it came was scintillating. “Perhaps she’s more of a woman than you are.”

  Her hand arced back to slap him. “Don’t try it,” he ordered. “I’ll only end up making love to you again.”

  “You don’t know what making love is!”

  “And you do?”

  His thrust hit home, pierced through to her core. “Get out!”

  In one fluid movement Cody rose from the bed and scooped up his jeans. Proudly unashamed of his nakedness, he stood before her and snapped them on. “I’m finished trying to find the real Abbie Dennis.” He tossed his shirt over one shoulder. He paused at the bedroom door. “When you find her, let me know.”

  * * * * *

  This time Abbie was careful to obtain permission for the Flagstaff field trip from the BIA in Gallop through the principal’s office. Without being told, she knew that she was on parole, that it would take just one more incident, even a minor one, and she would be denied the oppotunity to renew the final year’s portion of her two-year contract.

  “And just how do you propose to finance such an outing?” the principal demanded.

  “Remember the beads the children made? We had them sold in Tuba City.”

  Miss Halliburton drummed her pen against the desk. “Did you look into all the ramifications of such—”

  “I took care of everything,” Abbie hastened to reassure her, fearing that the older woman would refuse permission for the field trip.

  “Frankly, the best thing that could happen for everyone around here would be for you to quit, Mrs. Dennis.”

  “But I won’t.”

  Miss Halliburton looked down her romanesque nose at Abbie. “I’m beginning to realize that that’s one of your most noticeable characteristics —indomitability. A dangerous thing.”

  “And you wouldn’t say that you also share that trait, Miss Halliburton?”

  The principal’s eyes narrowed. “Yes. But I was intelligent enough—or perhaps I should say humble enough—not to come out to Kaibeto trying to change things to my way of thinking. It just so happens that the teachers who came before us might have known something more than we do.”

  Forgoing the issue, Abbie reverted to the original subject. “The sale of the necklaces raised enough money for the field trip. If I can find enough teachers and aides to volunteer to supervise the children ...”

  “And what about transportation?”

  “I thought I would see if we could borrow the Red Lake Boarding School’s two buses. We could make it to Flagstaff and back in one day.”

  “You realize that I’m almost hoping something goes awry?”

  “Yes.”
/>   * * * * *

  Dear Lord, please don’t let Robert run off again, Abbie prayed.

  She considered leaving the boy behind, but rejected the idea. He would probably choose just that time to run away from the school. Why had she had to end up with Robert? Ever since his father had failed to show up at Christmas, the boy had refused to participate in class. No longer would he even draw his pictures of Navajo Mountain. He simply stared out the window at February’s denuded trees and bleak, barren landscape. Why couldn’t he have picked on another teacher?

  She would just have to keep a hawk’s eye on him, which didn’t present that much difficulty in the end. The boy sat stolidly in the bus while the other children squealed and bounced and touched everything with curious fingers. Dalah and Becky, who hoped to see her lumberjack, had volunteered to help patrol the children. Even Marshall, when Miss Halliburton submitted Abbie’s proposed itinerary to his office, had elected to go along.

  Abbie, Becky, Dalah, Marshall—it seemed that they laughed with true enjoyment for the entire trip. They laughed at the Flagstaff Depot, when the train whistled in and the children hid their faces from the fire-breathing monster; they laughed at the supermarket, where the children made faces in the mirror over the vegetable bins; they even laughed on the paved streets, where the concrete gutters banked the curbs and the children got down on their knees, looking to see how deep the drainage holes were and yelling in to hear their echoes.

  “I can’t remember when I’ve had so much fun,” Marshall said on the return trip.

  Becky sat on the seat next to him, wiping the tears of laughter from her cheeks. Abbie, who sat with her across the aisle from Dalah and Marshall, caught the way the young Indian girl watched Marshall as he talked, and something in Dalah’s gaze made Abbie wonder. Could it possibly be Marshall whom Dalah cared for?

  Despite the merriment, Abbie returned from the excursion worn out and feeling lousy. Aspirin wasn’t the answer, and she made her way to the trading post just before closing time. “I don’t know what it is,” she told Orville, “but being corralled with thirty-four screaming children on a bus would drive even a saint to drink.”