Comanche Sunset

by Rosanne Bittner

  “Go,” Slow Woman said weakly. “Go…and let me…die.”

  Wade looked down at her. “No. I will stay with you for a while.”

  “No. Go to Wild Horse. Do…what must be…done.”

  Wade studied her, wanting to remember every feature, a chill moving through him at the realization that he was touching his real mother, something he had once never thought possible. He looked back at Aguila. “Is there a doctor around here—a real doctor—a white man’s doctor?”

  “She will not let a white man touch her. Even if she would, there is not one for many miles, two days at the least. She will not even live that long. I have heard that kind of breathing before. I know what it brings.”

  Wade looked down at Slow Woman. “Then I will stay until her death. I will hold her and look at her and talk to her. She is my mother.” He saw deep affection in her eyes, as her joy at knowing the other son had lived overcame the terror of what she had done. “This is all I will have of her,” Wade continued, touching her hair. “I will not leave.”

  Her eyes teared more, and she reached up with a shaking hand to touch his face. “I am…sorry…I left you to die. And yet…now I am sorry…you lived…for now you must die…all over again.”

  “If I do, it will have been worth it,” he answered. He drew her close, and she was too sick and weak to push away from him. He sat down and drew her into his arms, and she rested her head against his chest. Wade felt torn with emotion, wishing his white mother could be here. She would have understood this. She would have wanted to meet Slow Woman. Vivian Morrow’s love was all the motherly love he had ever known; yet he knew that this frail woman had also loved him all his life, but secretly.

  Aguila left, and a moment later a naked little girl snuck inside from under the rolled-up buffalo robes. She was perhaps three. She toddled up to Slow Woman, who still rested in Wade’s arms, seeming to be asleep. She stared at Wade a moment, then touched Slow Woman’s hair. “Father’s sister,” she said in the Comanche tongue. She patted the woman’s head.

  Wade watched her, realizing she had to be his cousin. The affection she showed the woman, and the protective defense Aguila had shown her earlier, as well as the fact that Aguila had taken care of the woman all these years and had been a father to Wild Horse, only verified that the Comanche were as capable of feelings and family closeness as any white family. Wild Horse’s own rage and revenge were because he had lost wives and sons to the white man. This was the first time Wade had heard there had been yet another wife and son whose deaths could be attributed to whites. Surely Wild Horse felt a deep hurt. Surely he had had strong feelings for the women he had called wife, and for the sons they had given him.

  The little girl put a small, chubby hand to his face then, smiling a wide, pretty smile. “Wild Horse,” she said. She leaned forward, touching her cheek to his, and he didn’t bother trying to explain who he was. She turned then and leaned down to crawl back out, her little bare bottom disappearing last.

  He looked down at his mother, feeling a sudden peace unlike any he had ever before experienced. Somehow, knowing this was the woman who had given him birth, knowing this was where his life began, helped ease the lonely feeling of never belonging anywhere. He realized he could not stay with them, but a part of him would always belong here.

  “Looks like Alice will have her vegetables again this year,” Enders told Jennifer. They walked beside a flower and vegetable garden behind Alice’s cabin, flowers and roses beginning to green up and pop open; tiny green shoots sprouting from seeds for peppers and beans. Jennifer still used her crutches, although she was sure she could get along without them now. It had been two weeks since Wade left, but she was stretching out her excuse of not being fully healed as long as she could, in order to keep Tony Enders from pushing her too hard too soon. He had already brought up the subject of marriage several times, and she knew that soon he would begin demanding answers from her.

  “Yes,” she answered. “Alice told me how much she enjoys gardening.” She kept her eyes averted, never able to look Enders straight in the eyes for fear he would see the dislike she held for him. She studied the garden, deciding Alice must have a very green thumb to be able to make anything grow out here, but thanks to the fort’s location close to Comanche Springs, there was enough water for a garden.

  Enders had told her the area where the fort was located had once been a primary gathering point for the Comanche, because of the plentiful supply of water. She thought to herself how angry she would be if someone stole such a precious gift of nature away from her, especially in this arid land. In some ways she could understand the vicious Comanche retaliation.

  She had learned, however, that men like Tony Enders had no interest or desire in understanding anything the Comanche did. To them the Comanche were evil, vicious, brutal animals, and she supposed in some respects they could be exactly that. After all, she had been the brunt of that brutality herself. Yet, after knowing Wade, she realized there had to be something more to the Indians than what the white man usually saw. Surely within their own families there was love and compassion.

  She reasoned that if Tony Enders would show just a little compassion himself, a little courtesy and gentleness when the subject of the Comanche arose, she could like him a little more. But to him they were “murdering savages,” and the country, especially Texans, would be better off if they were all dead.

  Jennifer had come to realize that it wasn’t just Enders’s attitude toward Indians that upset her. She felt instinctively that he had the same attitude toward most things, and that if she was his wife, he would show her hardly any more compassion than he would show a Comanche. She could tell by snide remarks and his general attitude and manners that he considered women inferior, something put on earth for man’s satisfaction and that was all.

  Oh, Wade, where are you? she thought. Please be all right. Please get back here soon.

  “The, uh, the preacher will be here in less than two weeks,” Enders was saying.

  How she dreaded this conversation. They had had it too many times already. “I see,” she answered.

  Enders stopped walking. “I don’t think you see at all,” he said. He put a hand on her arm and moved in front of her. “I want to marry you, Jenny, but you haven’t given me the slightest hint either way. This isn’t easy for me, you know, having to look at you, think of you as my wife. I mean, out here a man gets damn lonely, and…my God, woman, if we’re going to be married, why do we have to wait for everything. The least you could do is…well…”

  Before Jennifer realized what he was going to do he jerked her close, clamping his arms around her waist and pressing her tight to him while he planted his mouth over hers. She could smell whiskey and tobacco, and the kiss was not warm and sweet like Wade’s kisses. It was cold, and so rough that he hurt her mouth. Jennifer twisted in his arms, losing hold of one crutch, but managing to whack his left leg with the other.

  Enders grunted and let loose of her enough that she managed to step back from him, stumbling slightly. She wiped at her mouth savagely, tears of anger stinging her eyes. “How dare you,” she almost screamed.

  He rubbed at his leg a moment, looking at her darkly while she limped over to pick up her other crutch. He grabbed her shoulder and jerked her back around to look at him. “What do you mean, how dare I? My God, woman, you came here to marry me.”

  “I came here to see if I might want to marry you.” She told herself to calm down, that she might have to leave this place too soon if she wasn’t careful. “You must give me more time, Tony.” She pulled away again, shaking, longing for Wade. How could the touch of one man be so wonderful, and the touch of another be so repulsive?

  “You’ve had two weeks,” he complained. “Besides, what’s a kiss? It’s not as though I did anything to offend you. For God’s sake, you came out here with at least a pretty good idea of marrying me, didn’t you? I mean, how in hell can you know if you might like to be my wife if we don’t kiss?”<
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  “Watch your language,” she answered, her voice shaking. She walked a little farther away from him, scrambling to think of the right things to say without giving him too much hope. “If I want a kiss, you’ll know it. Right now, I’m still full of bad memories.”

  Enders frowned, wondering if he’d have a problem once she was his wife. He reminded himself she was a virgin and he had to be careful, but that only made him more anxious than ever. The thought of breaking her in made his desires soar, and he could hardly stand the thought of waiting another two weeks. Maybe if he just took her and had it over with she would find out how good it felt and wouldn’t be so cold and elusive. Then again, maybe it was more than that. Maybe she had lied about what the Comanche did to her. If she had, she certainly had no right to put him off. She wouldn’t even be worth marrying if that were true, except he’d marry her anyway in order to soak her uncle for all he could.

  “What bad memories?” he asked. “You told me the Comanche never touched you.”

  “They didn’t.” She kept her eyes averted, hating talking to him about something so intimate, hating the realization that the man was itching to get into her bed. “They didn’t need to,” she added. “Just knowing what they intended was bad enough—being tossed around like that, tearing at me…shooting me and trying to scalp me alive.” She turned and met his eyes, her own blazing now. “Don’t you think that’s enough horror to try to get over? They didn’t have to do more than that. What they did do was enough to give me nightmares for a long time to come! I’m sorry, Tony. If I had arrived here my normal self, without these memories, without these wounds, it would have been easier to try to get to know and to marry a stranger. But it’s all different now, and I need more time. You said yourself it will be two more weeks before the preacher arrives.”

  He held her eyes, his own showing a pompous pride. “You didn’t have to wipe your mouth like I had the plague.”

  She reddened slightly. “I’m sorry. It was just a reaction, from being so startled. I’m…I’m not used to men,” she said, hoping that would pacify him.

  He nodded, studying her closely. “What about that big half-breed who brought you here? You exposed your whole leg to him. More than that. He wrapped your ribs, didn’t he?”

  She turned away, appalled by the inflection in his words. “For heaven’s sake, Tony, I was wounded. I could have died.”

  “Fact remains that SOB saw more than I ever have. And I can’t believe he didn’t try something with you. Those Indians pant after white women like a bear after honey.”

  She faced him again. “I thought in time you would show your true self. Now I am beginning to see the real Anthony Enders, and it’s disgusting,” she said sternly. “You can believe what you want, but if you want to marry me, such remarks will do nothing but turn me away. Do you really think you can talk to me that way and then expect me to fall in love with you?”

  He sighed deeply, realizing if he wasn’t careful he would lose her and her uncle’s money. He was angry with himself for letting his terrible desire for her and his jealousy of the half-breed get in the way of his careful handling of her. She was driving him crazy with want. How did a man get to a woman like this? Most women he’d known were easy, but then most of them had been whores to begin with. This one was different, prim and proper, and too damn cold.

  “I don’t know what I thought,” he answered. “I just meant…well, I guess I just want you so bad myself that I can’t stand the thought of anybody else looking at you. Is that so terrible, Jenny? I mean, I already know I love you, and waiting like this, wondering if you’ll marry me, it’s driving me crazy. It makes me do and say the wrong things. I’m sorry. I’m real sorry.”

  Jennifer reminded herself that for the moment she had to keep going along with him. She all but hated the man, but she didn’t dare tell him so—not yet. It galled her to realize the things he was imagining with her and the Comanche, or how his dirty mind was working on her and Wade. And she knew now what he would do to her if he should get any idea of what had really happened between her and Wade. It had been beautiful, sacred. But someone like Tony Enders would make it into something ugly and sinful.

  “All right,” she managed to say. “I…accept your apology. But I don’t think I want to walk with you any more today. You can come for supper, day after tomorrow. I need tomorrow to think about things. I need a day away from you.”

  Bitch, he thought. He wanted to shout it at her. “Sure,” he answered aloud. “I’m…I’m real sorry we’ve got off to a bad start. And I’m sorry I haven’t realized how bad your experience with the Comanche affected you. Out here, we get kind of hardened to such things. We forget what it’s like for somebody who doesn’t understand this country. After you’ve been out here a while, you tend to get kind of hard and unmannerly. I, uh, I haven’t been around a proper lady in a long time. I really am sorry, Jenny.”

  She wished she could believe he meant it. At the same time, she knew the incident and her explanation of why she needed more time had bought her just that—more time. She hobbled closer to him, telling herself that for Wade’s sake she had to keep up the pretense. She leaned up and kissed his cheek, even though she would much rather have struck him.

  “I’m sorry, too,” she told him. “I’m sorry this whole thing became so difficult. I really did come out here to be married, Tony. A lot of things just got in the way.” She sighed and stepped back. “I’m going inside now. You don’t need to walk me. I’ll see you day after tomorrow.”

  He nodded, hating her, wanting her, wondering what was true and what wasn’t. He watched her for a moment, envisioning the body under the dress, then turned and stomped away, imagining shoving himself inside her while at the same time his hands were wrapped around her pretty, slender throat. He headed for his own barracks when Captain Howell stepped outside his quarters and called him over.

  Tony hurried over to the man, saluting when he came closer. “Yes, sir.”

  “I just thought I’d tell you, Enders, the Indian agent up by the Red River wired me that Wade Morrow did indeed go there. He heard about it from some of the Comanche and went to investigate. Morrow found his mother. She died while he was with her. He didn’t say where he was going from there, but some of the Comanche say he intends to find Wild Horse—they say Wild Horse wants to kill him because he’s a twin. You know how the Comanche are about those things.”

  Enders grinned. “Looks like Wade Morrow could lead us right to Wild Horse.” Inside he was more joyful over the fact that Wade Morrow would surely die. There was no way he could defeat Wild Horse. Big and experienced as he was, he was surely no match for Wild Horse’s savagery. He had not been able to make himself believe there had not been something between Wade Morrow and Jennifer, or that at least Wade Morrow would have liked it that way. Even though the man was supposedly no threat, the thought of him dead gave Tony Enders great pleasure. He would tell Jenny about it and see how she reacted. He would know by the look on her face if she had feelings for the half-breed.

  “I’m having Morrow followed,” Howell was saying. “Apache scouts will trail him but stay well behind him so he doesn’t spot them. If he leads them to Wild Horse, they’ll come and tell us, and Wild Horse will be ours. We ought to both earn a promotion out of that. You’ll be making more money then, Enders. That will help, with a new wife and all.”

  Her uncle’s money will help a lot more, Enders thought. “Yes, sir. How long ago was this?”

  Howell put a pipe into his mouth and puffed it a moment before answering. “About five days. The agent didn’t know about it till after Wild Horse’s mother was dead. That’s when some of the Indians told him another man had been there who was Wild Horse’s brother. He had already left by then, but the Apaches will be able to track him. They’d like nothing better themselves than to help catch a wanted Comanche leader. We’ll get him, Enders. We’ll get him. And if Wild Horse doesn’t kill Morrow, we’ll have him arrested, too, for consorting with a C
omanche renegade. The man lied to us about going back to California. He knew all along he was going to find Wild Horse, and he could have led us to him.” He clamped the pipe into his mouth again. “Well, stay alert and ready, Enders. Those Apache scouts could show up any time.”

  The man saluted Enders, then turned and re-entered his quarters. Enders almost laughed out loud. Wade Morrow would pay for setting eyes on Jennifer Andrews. And he would pay for lying about where he was going when he left the fort. The man knew all along he intended to go and find Wild Horse’s mother and Wild Horse himself. He wondered if Jennifer had also known what Morrow was going to do. If she did, then she was protecting the man—even protecting Wild Horse! There would be only one reason she would do that. He’d find out, one way or another.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  “I don’t know what to do, Alice,” Jennifer told the woman. They sat at the kitchen table, and a coyote yipped somewhere in the distance. The night hung dark and heavy, thick clouds hiding the moon. Jennifer rose and walked to the back door, looking through the screen into nothingness. “Tony kissed me today, against my will, I might add. I…didn’t enjoy it at all. I don’t think I could bring myself even to like him, let alone love him.”

  “Then it’s decided. You aren’t going to marry him,” the woman answered. She set down a cup of coffee. “It’s that simple. You’ll stay on here with me until you’re completely healed and think you’re ready for the hardship of a journey back to San Antonio. I’ll talk to Captain Howell about it myself. If you stay inside most of the time, there shouldn’t be any big problems with the other men; and if you help me with my work, you’ll be earning your keep. You said you had the money to pay back Sergeant Enders, didn’t you?”

  “Yes.” Thanks to Wade Morrow, Jennifer thought. “It just seems…I don’t know. Maybe it’s still too soon. I mean, it’s not too soon for me to know in my own heart. But maybe it’s too soon to tell the sergeant. I told him today to give me more time. He seemed…genuinely apologetic, when he realized how upset I was. But he made some rude remarks…about Wade Morrow seeing things he hadn’t seen himself yet. It was very embarrassing, and it only tells me where his mind is. I’m worried how he’d treat me once I was his wife. I don’t think he’d be very patient.”