Comanche Woman

by Joan Johnston

  Long Quiet cut her off abruptly. “Be silent.”

  When she opened her mouth to continue, his fingertips came to her lips in a gesture that was as much a caress as a warning. Then his hand slipped down to capture her breast. She watched in awe as he calmly turned his attention to Many Horses. “Did you wish to talk to me about something?”

  Many Horses was trembling visibly. His fists clenched and then unclenched before he allowed himself to speak in a voice that was barely audible. “I must speak to the families of those who did not return and to the puhakut. Will you join me, haints?”

  Bay saw the effort it took for Many Horses to control his sarcasm when he called Long Quiet friend. She was amazed by the extent of his possessiveness, and especially the fact that he’d let it show. The Comanche brave prided himself on his ability to be generous with what he owned, especially what was most precious to him—his horses and his wives. It must be especially irritating for Many Horses to discover in himself this sense of ownership, so foreign to him and his kind.

  Long Quiet was furious with himself. He’d known all along that Many Horses prized this woman—so why hadn’t he released Bay when Many Horses entered the tipi? He backed away from his earlier provocation by sliding his hand from Bay’s breast to her waist. But he couldn’t help thinking he would never have offered this woman to another man—no matter how great the debt, or how great the honor to be found in such generous giving.

  “I am honored that my friend has asked me to join him,” Long Quiet said. “But it has been long since I have eaten, and I must see to the welfare of my pony. If you wish it so, I will join you later.”

  It was a dismissal, one Long Quiet was entitled to issue since he was the host in this tipi.

  “Then I will see you later, haints.” Many Horses whirled and left, his back stiff with pride.

  It was quiet in the tipi when he’d gone. Bay waited for Long Quiet to speak, but he merely stared after Many Horses, his eyes blank.

  At long last he murmured, “He believes I have known you as a husband knows his wife.”

  Bay swallowed hard but said nothing.

  “Would you have me tell him otherwise?”

  Bay raised carefully neutral eyes to the man who held her in his arms, but she couldn’t keep the bitterness from her voice. “And let him think his generosity was refused? I do not pretend to understand this custom of sharing. Use me or do not. Say what you will. I have no choice in the matter.”

  Bay watched him ponder seriously before he replied, “Then I will say nothing until I leave. Then I will tell him the truth of what passed between us . . . or what did not.”

  “I won’t refuse you again,” she said.

  Long Quiet fought the urge to take her then and there, and it made him angry with her and with himself, for his own lack of control. “What makes you so willing suddenly to sacrifice yourself?”

  “I will not have you two fighting over me like rutting buffalo bulls!”

  “You will do whatever I ask without question?” he demanded.

  Bay shivered at the coldness in his eyes. “Yes,” she breathed. “Anything.”

  Long Quiet knew the courage it took for Bay to remain steadfast when she so obviously feared his power over her. He didn’t want her afraid of him. He wanted her warm and willing in his arms. He wanted to feel the upward thrust of her hips beneath him as he drove deep inside her, making them one. He tightened his hold on her as though expecting resistance and lowered his lips to hers. At first she welcomed him, her lips soft and wet. As his tongue probed her mouth she reluctantly opened to him, but even as he tasted her sweetness he could feel her body rejecting his touch.

  He raised his head and saw she was flushed, but whether from desire or embarrassment, he had no way of knowing. He dropped his hands in frustration.

  “Get some food for me. I’m hungry.”

  Bay scampered away like a scared rabbit, relieved to be saved, even momentarily, from examining her strange reactions to Long Quiet’s kiss. She didn’t understand the emotions she’d felt at the touch of his lips upon hers. This man was not her beloved Jonas. Or even Many Horses. He was nothing to her. She should have been afraid of him, but what she’d felt in his arms hadn’t even remotely resembled fear.

  There had been pleasure. Much pleasure. No man had ever made her feel like that. She’d withdrawn her body in an attempt to make the pleasure go away, but it hadn’t. She’d fled the tipi in fear not of Long Quiet, but of her own traitorous emotions.

  Long Quiet lay back down on the pallet and folded his arms under his head to think. He didn’t like the truth he’d discovered: He was besotted with her. He’d thought his attraction for her might have waned with time. Instead, it had intensified so much that he’d nearly caused a confrontation with Many Horses over possession of the woman. He tried to think of the humor in the situation. Who would have thought Many Horses would offer him his heart’s desire? Or that he would be having second thoughts about taking advantage of the offer!

  Long Quiet tasted the bitter gall of defeat. He’d wondered what he would do if Bay Stewart had a Comanche family, and he’d found his answer. He could not take her from this place if she wasn’t willing to go. She’d offered herself to him, but it hadn’t been a willing offer, and he found himself reluctant to take what he wanted by force.

  But could he leave here without tasting of the forbidden fruit that had been so temptingly set before him? Could he sleep next to her warmth another night without taking her in his arms?

  It was sheer madness on his part that he hadn’t taken her last night. He wanted to show her the ecstasy a man and woman could share. While it was hard for him to understand her white sensibilities, she obviously hadn’t left them all behind in the few years she’d been among the Comanches. She needed time to know him, time to acknowledge the fact that their destinies lay together. But in three and a half weeks, he had to meet Creed in Laredo. He could feel the tightening in his gut at the thought that he was going to get this close to realizing his dream but no closer. He shut his eyes to think.

  Would she like him better if he came to her as the white man, Walker Coburn? He rejected the idea even as it formed. He could never live among the White-eyes. He was Comanche. If she were to accept him, it must be as one of The People.

  When she returned, Bay found Long Quiet lying on the pallet with his eyes closed. Thinking he was asleep again, she bent to set down the food she’d carefully arranged on a piece of bark. Before she could do so, he opened his eyes. When he saw her he sat up cross-legged, waiting patiently for his breakfast.

  If Bay had had any doubt whether Long Quiet was Indian or white, it was settled as she watched him dip into the bowl of mashed boiled corn with his fingers. He alternated between corn mush and bites of the venison she’d seared over a fire outside the tipi.

  “Aren’t you hungry?” he asked.

  “I’ll eat later.”

  “Why not share this with me? You’ve brought more than enough for both of us.”

  “I don’t think—”

  “I insist.”

  Bay didn’t think she could swallow, she was so nervous, but Long Quiet wasn’t giving her any choice. She edged closer to him and dipped her fingers into the bowl of corn mush. Their fingers brushed and she fought against the reflex jerk that threatened to sling mush into both their laps.

  “Do you miss the White-eyes’ ways very much?”

  He was speaking in Comanche again, and Bay had to concentrate to find the words with which to answer. She licked her fingers clean before she said, “Some of them, yes.”

  “Which ones?”

  She searched for the Comanche words for utensils for eating and realized there was no way she was going to be able to easily carry on this conversation in another language. She answered in English, “Utensils for eating.”

  “We can speak in English if you wish.”

  Bay nodded gratefully.

  He smiled and wiggled his fingers as he said
, “These are simpler to take along on a journey than knives and forks.”

  Bay held out her own fingers, which still bore a residue of corn mush, and smiled back. “But messier.”

  “That’s easy to remedy.”

  Before Bay realized what he intended, Long Quiet had taken her hand and slipped two of her fingers into his mouth. He used his tongue to clean them and then sucked gently. She felt a tingling in her belly that somehow seemed misplaced at breakfast. His tongue grudgingly released her fingers as his hand withdrew them from his mouth.

  “There. Is that better?”

  Bay stared at her clean, wet fingers as though they belonged to someone else, then looked up at Long Quiet to find laughter in his slate-gray eyes. She wished she understood what he expected of her. The tension of wondering when, or whether, he was going to demand his right to bed her was becoming unbearable. She forced a wan smile in return. “Much better. Thank you.”

  He picked up the conversation as though what he’d done was nothing out of the ordinary. “What else do you miss?”

  Bay replied wistfully, “Sitting in a chair, lying in a bed, having a room to myself . . .”

  “How many share your tipi?”

  “There are three of us.” He raised a questioning brow, and Bay continued, “I live with Little Deer and with Cries at Night, the mother of Many Horses’ first wife, who died in childbirth.”

  “Many Horses has taken no other wife?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  Bay’s brow creased in thought. “How can I answer that? It’s not as though there are no young women willing to become his wife.” Bay thought of She Touches First, whose eyes rarely left Many Horses when they were anywhere near one another. “He simply hasn’t chosen to take another woman to his pallet.”

  “I would not desire another woman, either, if I had you.”

  Bay’s head jerked up and her eyes flew to Long Quiet’s. “You mustn’t say such things.”

  “Why not, when it’s the truth? I want you as I’ve never wanted another woman.”

  “Then take me and get it over with!” Bay was sorry as soon as she’d spoken the impulsive words and covered her mouth with the back of her hand.

  “I can wait. If I—when I spill my seed within you, it will be because we both desire it.”

  His calm, certain reply sent a shiver of fearful anticipation through Bay. She was helpless to move as he reached out to caress her cheek. The hand at her mouth dropped to her chest in an attempt to slow the hammering of her heart. She was confused. She should have been afraid of him, for she knew the joining of their two bodies would not be a gentle thing, despite the fact he’d shown he could be gentle.

  “I must see to my pony before I join Many Horses,” Long Quiet said. Without another word, he was gone.

  Bay stood up unsteadily. When she turned to leave the tipi, she ran directly into Cries at Night.

  “I am sorry, Pia,” Bay rasped. “I was not watching where I was going.”

  “Help me sit,” Cries at Night said. “These old bones need a rest already.” As she collapsed on the nearby buffalo robe, she said, “Tell me about this man with whom Many Horses has shared his most prized possession. Who is he?”

  “His name is Long Quiet. He rescued Many Horses from the Tonkawas, and in return Many Horses has asked that I serve him until he leaves us,” Bay explained.

  Cries at Night pursed an already much-wrinkled mouth. “I do not understand this.”

  “What troubles you, Pia?”

  “I cannot believe Many Horses will allow Long Quiet to depart this village with the knowledge of your presence.”

  “Why not? Long Quiet saved his life. They are brothers.”

  “Did Many Horses seek out the medicine of the puhakut before he gave you to Long Quiet?”

  “I . . . I don’t think so. I don’t know.”

  Cries at Night drew in a hissing breath and muttered, “It is bad. It is very bad.”

  “What is wrong?”

  “How could Many Horses ignore the tabu and give you to another man? He has put the source of his puha in another man’s hands. Pah! There is no help for it now. We will have to wait and see what the puhakut will have to say about all this.”

  At that same moment, She Touches First was anxious to find out the same thing. She came flying into the puhakut’s tipi without waiting for permission to enter, because the news she brought her brother was so exciting she was willing to face his wrath if he chose to chastise her recklessness.

  “He gave her away to a stranger!”

  He Decides It had dropped a whole handful of pecans when She Touches First had come bursting in. He looked up irritably and asked, “Who gave who away?” before beginning a search through the matted buffalo wool beneath him for his scattered breakfast.

  “Many Horses is back and has given Shadow away.”

  Those words stopped his hand where it was and brought his head up to meet his sister’s eyes, which glowed with undisguised satisfaction.

  “Are you sure?”

  “As certain as the gossip of the women can make me. I tell you Shadow spent the night in Many Horses’ guest tipi with another man.”

  “Many Horses must be crazy! It is tabu for Shadow to be with—”

  “—with anyone from the village. But, brother, all-wise puhakut, your tabu did not say anything about another man.”

  “I did not think it necessary. Shadow is the source of Many Horses’ puha. He would never allow another man near her. I cannot think what would make him do such a thing.”

  At that moment, He Decides It heard keening wails of lament from the direction of Eagle Feather’s tipi. “So. They did not all come home.”

  “Only Many Horses. Both who traveled with him were killed by Tonkawas.”

  A second set of shrieks joined the cries from the other tipi as Many Horses gave his sad news to the family of He Follows the Trail.

  “Many Horses will come here next,” She Touches First said. “What will you tell him of his decision to give away the woman? Will it bode ill for him or well?”

  “I cannot say. I will have to hear the reasons for what he has done. Then I can make medicine to see whether the spirits approve.”

  He Decides It blamed the continued irritation in his voice on his inability to locate the pecans he’d dropped. But it was moments like this that brought home to him how staggering a responsibility it was to be medicine man for the village and to have the power of life and death over those who came to him for advice. Now he must interpret the results of Many Horses’ impulsive gesture in sending Shadow to stay with a stranger.

  Perhaps this was the excuse he needed to send the white woman away. He knew that would please his sister. She believed that the only thing keeping Many Horses from making her his paraibo, his chief wife, was Shadow’s presence in the village. She was wrong, but he could not confess to his sister the falsehoods he’d told that had led Many Horses to reject her.

  What should he do?

  He Decides It grunted in disgust and dug deeper in the buffalo robe. He could think better on a full stomach.

  She Touches First knelt down to help her brother gather up the sweet nuts he’d dropped. “Do you think Many Horses will let Shadow leave the village?”

  “How can I say what he will do?”

  “You can tell him what he should do!”

  “I cannot lead him where he will not go.”

  “You gave that woman the power she holds over the greatest warrior in this village. You can take it away.”

  “How can I do that?”

  “Tell Many Horses he has broken his tabu by giving Shadow to another man and that he must give back her medicine and send her from this place as quickly as he can.”

  “I must think about what I will say to Many Horses,” he said. “Leave me now.”

  She Touches First dropped a handful of pecans into her brother’s hand as she rose. “This is the best chance you will ever ha
ve to rid our village of that woman. If you do not do it now, the day will come when you will regret it.”

  With that warning, she left.

  He Decides It threw the whole handful of nuts into his mouth, ignoring the bits of sand and buffalo wool that had been added, and chewed on the gritty mess while he pondered the situation. As puhakut, he knew much about the individual weaknesses of those who lived in his village. They came to him when they needed powerful medicine to allay their fears of the Great Spirit, of Father Sun, Mother Moon, and the Earth Mother. They expected him to know how to combat the evils of disease and famine. They sought from him an explanation of the births and deaths, the good hunts and bad, the successes or failures in war, that made their lives a frightening yet wonderful mystery.

  He knew Many Horses believed his extraordinary success in battle and in the hunt over the past three years was due to his possession of Shadow and to his observance of the personal tabu He Decides It had imposed on Many Horses, which would not allow the war chief of the Quohadi to take from his captive that which he had wanted most. Only He Decides It knew exactly how high the price had been for Many Horses’ powerful medicine.

  Well, the puhakut mused as he ran his tongue around his teeth to collect the last residue of pecans, he hadn’t exactly said it would be tabu for any other man to touch Shadow as a woman. But Many Horses must surely be wondering whether his puha had been weakened now that he’d given her to another man. It was up to him to settle the matter.

  “Hu! May I come in?”

  He Decides It made sure he was seated imposingly across from the tipi opening before he signaled to Many Horses, “Hihites! You are welcome here.”

  The haggard look on Many Horses’ face confirmed that he wasn’t sure what disaster he might have caused by his actions. He Decides It gestured Many Horses to a seat of honor at his right side. The puhakut sat silently, waiting for Many Horses to speak of the matter that had brought him here. He would not be forced by impatience into revealing what he knew.