“I think you know, dear,” Adeline said, moving to one side. “And don’t expect help from your friends.”
The man in black halted and brushed the right flap of his jacket aside, exposing a pistol stuck under his black sash. But instead of grabbing it he reached into an inside pocket.
Winona saw him draw a small gun, smaller than any she had ever seen, and point it at her. She tensed, dreading what would happen next and wishing she had a weapon. “Why?” she asked, stalling while she racked her brain for a way out of the fix she was in.
“That you will never know,” Adeline said harshly, then seemed to soften. “Actually, I can’t blame you, can I? I hear that any Indian woman would give her eyeteeth to hook a white man. You were only doing what comes naturally to your kind.” She glanced at Nate. “He’ll get over you eventually. And he’ll get over your half-breed brat as well.”
“Don’t you lay a finger on our son!” Winona cried, taking a step toward the woman and raising her right fist to strike. She heard the crack of the small gun, her legs gave way, and she fell. The last sight she saw before a dark cloud enveloped her mind was the smirking face of Adeline Van Buren.
Chapter Twenty
Was that a shot?
The thought startled Nate and he tried to open his eyes. His consciousness seemed to be adrift in a black sea, bobbing on invisible waves. The last thing he could recall was tangling with the panther. How long had he been out? How badly was he hurt? Gritting his teeth, his blood pounding in his temples, he struggled to rouse himself. Dimly he heard voices. And then the surface of the black sea transformed into a gigantic tidal wave that swept down upon his flickering awareness and drowned him in a whirlpool of vertigo and confusion.
Later he experienced a sensation of movement and had the impression he was being carried.
Much later he thought his eyes opened briefly and before him stood a vision of radiant loveliness. But again he passed out, lost in limbo.
The merry chirping of sparrows brought him around once more and he lay still, listening and gathering his feeble strength. He felt weak and disoriented. His mouth was abominably dry, his body warm. He carefully organized his thoughts, remembering the fight with the big cat and the wounds he had sustained. The images he had seen and the impressions he had had since the fight might be the product of his imagination. For all he knew just a few minutes had gone by and he was lying on the ground near the panther. If he moved the cat might pounce.
So he held himself still, recuperating, and realized a soft object had been draped from his toes to his neck. By the smooth feel of the fabric on the tops of his hands, which rested on his thighs, he guessed it was a blanket. So he must be lying in camp somewhere, but if so why didn’t he hear the crackling of a fire or the voices of his family and friends?
After an interminable period he mustered the energy to open his eyes. Immediately he suspected he must be dreaming for he was in a large bed in a plush room adorned with rich furnishings. Heavy gold curtains covered the large bay windows. A thick carpet covered the floor. All the furniture was polished mahogany.
Where could he be? With a strenuous effort he rose onto his elbows and inspected the bedroom in amazement. The only explanation he could think of was that he must be in St. Louis. If so, he had been unconscious for a long time indeed.
A door opposite from the bed suddenly opened and in stepped the woman who had haunted his conscience ever since he left New York City years ago.
“Adeline!” he blurted out.
She halted, taken aback, then smiled broadly and rushed over to clasp his hand in hers. “Nate! Thank God! You’ve come around at last!”
Nate was utterly confounded. He didn’t know what to say. Although he had expected to meet her when he arrived in St. Louis, the shock of encountering her so unexpectedly left him speechless. Sparked by her exquisite beauty, all of his old feelings for her surged to the surface. He stared into her keen blue eyes and gave rein to memories of the happy times they had shared in New York City.
“Cat got your tongue?” Adeline joked.
All Nate could do was shake his head.
“How do you feel?” she inquired. “Want me to send for Doctor Mangel?”
Finding his voice, Nate croaked, “No. Thank you. I’m fine at the moment.”
Adeline scrutinized his face. “You’ve changed, Nate. You’re bigger and broader than I remember. And where did you get all those muscles?” She grinned self-consciously. “You would make any woman proud to call you her husband.”
The statement jarred Nate into thinking about his wife and son, and he berated himself for not thinking about them sooner. Feeling a twinge of guilt he nodded at the open door. “Where are Winona and Zachary? For that matter, where am I?”
Sadness lined Adeline’s visage. “You’re at an estate about twelve miles north of St. Louis. It’s owned by an old friend of my father’s, Jacques Debussy. When we heard about the trappers who had found you and brought you to the city, I insisted on having you brought here so I could tend you personally.”
“Trappers found me?” Nate said, bewildered. Fleeting panic stabbed through him. “What are you talking about? Where is my family? And where is my friend Shakespeare McNair and his wife?”
“I don’t know how to tell you,” Adeline said, her voice quavering.
“Tell me what?” Nate demanded, sitting up, forgetting all about his wounds and his weakness in his apprehension for those he loved most in the world.
Adeline was a study in sorrow. She wrung her hands and half-turned, her eyes mere slits. When she spoke emotion choked her words. “I would rather that the good doctor or Jacques told you. Anyone other than myself. I don’t like being the bearer of terrible tidings.”
Nate, scarcely able to breathe, grabbed her wrist. “Don’t torture me like this. If you know something, then for God’s sake tell me.”
“If you insist,” Adeline said softly, and stiffened her slender shoulders. She faced him. “The trappers found the bodies of another man, two women, and a young boy near where they found you.”
“No!” Nate exclaimed, beset by dizziness. He released her and sank onto his pillow. “I don’t believe it.”
“I’m so sorry,” Adeline said in sympathy, and put her hand on his shoulder. “Evidently they were attacked by Indians. One of the trappers said something about the Cheyenne. They believed you were spared because the Indians thought you were already dead, killed by a slain panther lying near your body.”
“No,” Nate said again, with less vehemence. “It couldn’t be.” Dazed, he shook his head, refusing to accept that Winona and Zach were gone. It was impossible! his heart told him. But his head said something else. Everything Adeline said made sense. It was entirely possible the Cheyennes had somehow tracked them and caught up just after the cat attacked him. Shakespeare and the women would have been preoccupied and easy for the Cheyennes to ambush.
“I wish someone else had told you,” Adeline said tenderly. “I can imagine the anguish you must be feeling. I lost both my father and mother two years ago.”
“You did?” Nate said absently, the full magnitude of his loss belatedly sinking in. He felt numb in body, mind, and soul.
“Yes,” Adeline answered. “But we’ll discuss it later. Right now I think you should get more rest. I’ll send a servant for the doctor.”
“If you want,” Nate mumbled, closing his eyes. Her hand lightly caressed his cheek. Then her footsteps drifted to the door and it closed. He rolled onto his side and curled into a fetal posture, unable to achieve a rational thought. Over and over the same two words repeated themselves in his mind: They’re dead! They’re dead! They’re dead!
He had always known all of them ran the risk of death in the wilderness. In a realm where survival of the fittest determined those who lived and those who didn’t, anyone could die at any time. But he had always anticipated enjoying a long life with Winona, anticipated seeing their son and other children grow to become mature
adults and move away to have families of their own. Eventually he would rock his grandchildren on his knee and tell tall tales of how it was back in the days of his prime.
Now none of that would occur.
Moisture filled his eyes. Tears trickled down his face. He attempted to stop them and he might as well have been trying to stop a flood. Soundlessly he cried, oblivious to his surroundings, feeling acute torment in the depths of his being. An hour later or was it two? he cried himself to sleep.
Sunlight on his face awakened him and he sat up, groggy from too much sleep, too little food, and the effects of crying into complete exhaustion. The curtains had been opened and he could see a lush garden outside the window. An elderly man was engaged in trimming rose bushes.
The blanket had slid down to his waist while he slept, and he discovered for the first time he was wearing nothing underneath. He examined the bandages, then pulled the blanket up to his chest.
“You’re awake again! How wonderful.”
He looked up as Adeline and a stranger entered, a man who wore spectacles, a brown jacket and white shirt, and brown knee-length breeches. In his right hand he held a beaver top hat.
“How fortunate,” Adeline said. “Doctor Mangel has just arrived. You can ask him all about your condition.”
“Doctor,” Nate said.
“Mr. King;” Mangel replied. “You are a very lucky man. I’ve been informed of your rescue and I can safely say that had those trappers not found you when they did, you wouldn’t be with us any longer.”
Ghosts of Winona and Zach made Nate scowl. “Luck, like most things in life, is relative, Doctor.”
“Eh?” Mangel said, puzzled by the assertion. “I suppose so.” He halted at the bed and inspected the bandage on Nate’s neck. “Other than being weak and badly malnourished, how are you feeling?”
“Stiff and sore. Otherwise no complaints.”
“Excellent. I’ll instruct the cook to begin feeding you hot meals. Soups and stews initially, of course, until your stomach adjusts to containing food again. In about a week you should be able to eat solids without any problem.”
Nate said nothing.
Doctor Mangel glanced at Adeline. “If you would be so kind as to turn around, I’d like to check the rest of this gentleman’s bandages.”
“Of course.”
Mangel conducted the examination swiftly and expertly. When he was done he hiked the blanket over Nate’s chest and stepped back. “There hasn’t been any bleeding since my last visit. The worst of your ordeal is over. Given rest and proper nourishment you should be on your feet in a week. In two weeks you should be able to go out for fresh air.”
“I can’t wait that long,” Nate said.
“Why not?” Mangel asked.
“I have something to do. In a week I’ll be in the saddle and on my way west.”
“You do and you’ll kill yourself. Anyone who has lost as much blood as you have must gradually resume normal activities. Stay here and let Miss Van Buren take care of you until I decide you are fit enough to travel.”
“I’ll do the deciding,” Nate insisted.
Doctor Mangel looked at Adeline, who had turned. “Reason with him, will you? It’s certain suicide if he doesn’t listen to me.” He moved to the doorway. “I’ve said my piece, Mister King. Disobey at your own risk.”
When they were alone Adeline fidgeted and clasped her hands at her waist. “I think you offended him.”
“Didn’t mean to,” Nate said with a shrug.
“Why must you leave so soon? Is my company that deplorable?” Adeline asked almost shyly.
“Not at all. But I must see that my wife and son and my friends are buried properly. As it is there might not be anything left of them by the time I get there.”
“Oh,” Adeline said in surprise. “I should have guessed.” She came closer. “If that’s all it is, you can rest easy. The trappers who found you buried everyone else.” Pausing as if recalling something, she concluded with, “Even a black dog.”
Samson too? Nate sagged, feeling utterly empty inside. Everyone and everything that had mattered most to him was gone. All his reasons for living had been stripped from him, torn from his hands by the cruelest of fates. His own life seemed paltry and hardly worth the living.
Adeline, misunderstanding, started to leave. “You need food immediately. I’ll have the cook send up a bowl of soup.”
“Adeline?”
She stopped and gazed fondly at him. “Yes?”
“Thanks again for everything you’ve done.”
“You can thank me by heeding the advice of your physician and recovering. We have much to talk about, you and I. I would hate to lose you after traveling so far and trying so hard to locate you.”
“Why did you come to St. Louis?”
“I’ll explain some other time, after you’re rested.”
He sat and gazed blankly at the window after she was gone. In his mind’s eye he beheld the faces of Winona and Zach, floating in the center of the room as it were, both aglow with vitality and contentment. He started to life a hand, to touch them, then realized his folly and let his hand fall limply onto the blanket.
Their deaths were his fault and his alone. He should never have come to St. Louis. If he had headed home when the Rendezvous concluded, his wife and son would be alive and well, And so would the man who had taken him under his wing and patiently instructed him in the craft of wilderness survival. Poor Shakespeare had been tricked into making the journey, and Nate had to bear the burden of having duped his friend for the rest of his days.
Drowsiness assailed him and he shut his eyes. How accurate hindsight was! If men and women could foresee the consequences of their decisions before those decisions were made, every person would be as wise as Solomon and never make a mistake. Whether by higher design or not, the only way a person learned was through experience, and unfortunately adversity was part and parcel of many of those experiences.
He draped a forearm over his eyes. Even if the trappers had buried his family, he felt compelled to return and erect markers on their graves. He owed them that much. It was the very least he could.
The very, very least.
Chapter Twenty-One
For three days Nate saw no one other than Adeline, Doctor Mangel, and an elderly woman who brought all of his meals, a maid in the employ of Monsieur Jacques Debussy. The maid spoke French fluently but knew little English, which limited their conversations to an exchange of greetings and nothing more.
During those three days Nate saw nothing of the man whose hospitality made his convalescence possible. From Adeline he learned the Debussy family had settled in the St. Louis area back in 1774, ten years after two French fur traders set up a trading post on the site that would later grow to become the city itself. The family prospered, acquired a large estate, and weathered the change in government when St. Louis was acquired by the United States as part of the
Louisiana Purchase in 1804. In succinct response to questions from Nate, Adeline disclosed the Debussy family had widespread business interests, with investments in everything from the fur trade to raising grain and cattle.
On the evening of the third day, feeling much stronger and impatient to be up and about, Nate slid out of bed and padded on naked feet to an open closet. Inside hung his torn buckskins, while in the corner leaned his Hawken. On the floor were his pistols, his butcher knife and tomahawk, and his ammo pouch and powder horn. Everything else had been taken by the Cheyennes. Pegasus, the other mounts, all of the pack animals and all the supplies were gone. He had been surprised to learn the Cheyennes had failed to take his weapons and commented on it to Adeline. She had promptly answered that the trappers came on the scene as the Indians were gathering their booty and the Cheyennes had fled rather than confront six armed whites. In their haste the Cheyennes had neglected to strip his weapons.
Now he donned his britches, grimacing at a series of painful twinges, then shuffled to the window and
stood in the warm sunlight. The bedroom fronted to the west and he could see the rosy sun sinking toward the distant horizon. He spotted the gardener digging to the south, and when the man idly glanced in his direction, he waved. Oddly, the gardener put down his shovel and hastened off, disappearing behind a hedge. What was that all about? he wondered.
“You shouldn’t be out of bed.”
He replied without turning around. “I wasn’t expecting you until later.”
“Obviously,” Adeline said, and came over to stand next to him. “Keep this up and you’ll have a relapse. Then you’ll be in bed for much longer. Do you want that to happen?”
“I’m recovering nicely,” Nate said, smiling at her. He couldn’t get over how beautiful she was, even more so than he had recollected, although her face had changed in subtle ways. Thin lines radiated outward from each eye, crow’s-feet they were called, and she habitually held her mouth pressed tight, her jaw muscles tense, as if she were under some sort of strain. Her eyes, when not fixed on him, seemed strangely colder than he remembered. But her body was as full and lovely as ever and her voice as smooth as silk.
“Do you still intend to place markers on the graves of your family?”
“I do.”
Adeline shook her head reproachfully. “I wish you would reconsider. You said yourself there are no landmarks out on the prairie and you might not be able to find the spot where the panther jumped you. Why risk your life needlessly?”
“It’s something I have to do,” Nate said.
“You were never this stubborn back in New York.”
Nate watched the setting sun.
“You’ve changed in more ways than I would have imagined,” Adeline went on. “You’re not the same man who would do whatever I wanted without objecting, who always agreed that I knew best.”
“You sound disappointed.”
“Not at all,” Adeline said quickly. “But it has come as a bit of a shock.” She paused. “When I first arrived out here and heard the stories being told, I couldn’t believe them. Jacques has many friends who trap for a living, and from them he had learned a lot about you. About how the Indians had taken to calling you Grizzly Killer, and how you were one of the most famous fur men, as well known as Jim Bridger, Joe Meek, or Shakespeare McNair.”
Hawken Fury (Giant Wilderness Book One) Page 15
