Dorothy Garlock - [Wabash River]

by River of Tomorrow

  In her good dark dress, now devoid of collar and braid, Mercy stood beside Daniel while the preacher’s voice droned on. She looked at the lines of the homely, weathered faces around her. They were arranged somberly to fit the occasion. A few tears squeezed from the eyes of some of the women, but they blinked them away.

  After the sermon they all filed past the box for one last look at their mother. When the last neighbor had walked past the coffin, Hod nodded to Daniel. He stepped forward, placed the lid on the box, took nails from his pocket, and nailed it firmly in place.

  The five Baxter brothers then lifted their mother’s coffin to their shoulders and carried it out the door. The mourners followed them up the hill to the final resting place of the Baxters who had gone before. There were the graves of two children, both girls, who had been stillborn, and the graves of two more, a boy and a girl, who had not yet reached the age of three years when they died. William Baxter, who had sired them all, rested there. His name was carved on the wooden slab that marked his grave. It was a sweet plot of ground with honeysuckle and wild roses running over it, and tall trees shading it.

  After the coffin was lowered into the ground, Mercy stood beside her brothers with her eyes lifted to the hills while Cousin Farley consigned her mother’s body to the earth.

  “Dear God, here’s yore servant, Mary Len Baxter. Take her to yore kingdom so that she may walk the streets o’ gold and know no pain or sorrow.” The old man’s voice boomed in the quiet of the hillside. “Ashes to ashes, dust to dust . . .”

  The ceremony was brief. As soon as the first clods of dirt tapped a knocking on the wooden box, Dora cried out and leaned heavily on Wyatt’s arm. Martha stood beside Hod, dry-eyed, her baby nestled in her arms. Mercy knew Martha felt the loss even more than she did, for she had been with her, tending her. It was strange to think of it now, but she had known her own mother for only two short days. Tears filled Mercy’s eyes as the mourners raised their voices in song.

  Rock of Ages, cleft for me,

  Let me hide myself in Thee:

  Let the water and the blood,

  From Thy wounded side which flow’d,

  Be of sin and double cure,

  Save from wrath and make me pure.

  Mercy lifted her eyes beyond the open hole in the earth and closed her ears against the sound of the earth spilling onto the wooden box. As the mourners continued to sing, occasionally a sob from one of the women could be heard. When it was over and the fresh earth was rounded over the new grave, Mercy stepped forward and scattered a handful of roses she had picked from the bush that clambered up the stone chimney of the cabin where Mary Len Baxter had spent most of her life.

  Mercy and Daniel lingered at the burial site until everyone had gone back down the hill to the homestead. Then they went to stand at each of the graves in the small plot and read the inscriptions on the boards. At her father’s grave she read the crudely printed words.

  WILLIAM LUTHER BAXTER

  1780–1828

  Beloved husband and father

  Each of the children had a marker. Some of the boards were so weathered that Mercy had to kneel down and trace the letters with her fingers. Gladys, 1809. Maude, 1811. Myrtle, 1812–1815, Robert, 1814–1816. Mercy realized that it was when Maude was born that her father had taken her to relatives on the Green River to stay until her mother recovered from the birth.

  Daniel stood quietly by until Mercy was ready to leave the burial plot, then he took her hand and they walked back down the hill to the homestead.

  * * *

  Mercy came out of the house and sat down on the edge of the porch beside Daniel. The night was clear and cool, the stars bright. She could see the Big Dipper tipping its empty cup over the trees. She was homesick, terribly homesick, for Quill’s Station, for Mamma and Papa, for Mary Elizabeth and Zack.

  Not long after the last wagonload of neighbors departed, Hod had taken his family and gone to the cabin beyond the pines. Wyatt and Dora also had gone home. Cousin Farley, tired from the long ride, had gone to bed. The younger brothers had not shown themselves since their mother’s funeral.

  As soon as Mercy sat down, Daniel put his arm around her and pulled her close to his side.

  “When can we go home, Daniel?”

  “As soon as you want to.”

  “Let’s go tomorrow. There’s nothing to keep us here now.” She leaned her head against his shoulder.

  “We’ll leave in the morning. Don’t you want to go to bed? You’re worn-out,” he whispered, his lips against her forehead.

  “I am tired,” she said wearily. Then, “We got here just in time, didn’t we?”

  “Yes, we did. I understand now why Lennie and Bernie were in such a hurry to get back. It was quite an undertaking for them to go all the way to Quill’s Station just on the rumor that they might find their long-lost Sister there.”

  “Daniel, I don’t want to be mad at them anymore for forcing me to come here.”

  “Think about it, honey. They didn’t force you.”

  “They made me feel guilty. That’s why I came. It wasn’t out of love for my mother. I couldn’t even think of anyone except Liberty as Mother. I’m glad I came. I’m no longer ashamed of being a Baxter. They’re good, honest, hardworking people.”

  “Yes they are that. Their ways are not our ways, but that doesn’t necessarily make them wrong.”

  “Now we’ve got to think about our other problem,” Mercy murmured.

  “Is it really a problem?” he asked softly.

  She raised her head so that she could look at him, and his heartbeat picked up speed. Looking into her face, he marveled that she was so beautiful. His eyes feasted on her face, surrounded by its golden aureole of hair. Her eyes were like stars, the curve of her lips perfect.

  “I think it is, don’t you?”

  “Why is it such a problem? No, don’t answer,” he said quickly, not wanting to hear what she would say. “We promised we wouldn’t talk about it until we were on the way home.” With his hands at her waist he put her from him and they got to their feet. “Go on, honey. Get ready for bed.”

  “You . . . kissed me last night.”

  He looked down at her for a long moment. “Then maybe you’d better kiss me tonight,” he whispered.

  Mercy’s hands moved up his chest to his face. She held her palms against his cheeks, stood on tiptoes, and gently placed her mouth against his. He increased the pressure, and his hungry mouth drank in the sweetness of hers. She made no effort to move away from him. His hands tightened around her waist; his breathing and heartbeat were all mixed up. With utmost tenderness she moved her lips against his. He thought surely she would feel the evidence of his desire that throbbed so hurtfully between them, and be frightened of it.

  Her arms slid down to wrap tightly around his waist. She pressed the full length of her body against him and was made instantly aware of the elongated hardness pressing against her stomach. She felt him tremble when she moved against it, and wild, sweet enchantment rippled through her. His lips had moved against hers urgently when she kissed him. His pulse was racing as wildly as hers, his virile body reacting to hers. Daniel was no longer thinking of her as his Sister but as a lover!

  Stirred by the incredible discovery of his hard male sex pressing against her, she kissed him again with intimate sensuousness and parted her lips to run the tip of her tongue across his mouth.

  Finally, reluctantly, he put her from him. “Go to bed, sweet one.” The words seemed to be wrenched from him.

  Disappointment knocked at her heart. She raised her eyes to look into his, but he bent his head and placed a gentle kiss on her forehead.

  “You’ll come in . . . soon?”

  “In a while.”

  * * *

  Daniel did not come to their bed. It seemed to Mercy that hours passed while she lay waiting hopefully for him. Finally she got out of bed and went to look out the door. He was clearly visible in the moonlight, sitting on the stum
p beside the woodpile. He was not coming to bed until he was sure that she was asleep. The thought ran wildly through her mind as she watched him. On the heels of that disappointing thought there was another brighter one—the next night they would be alone.

  Daniel saw the blur of white in the doorway. Mercy was waiting for him to come in. She had clung to him the last few days as she had when she was a child—moving close to him, taking his hand when she was confused or unsure. He understood that. They had grown up together—he was familiar, safe. She had been thrust among strangers who expected her to feel as if she belonged here. They and their ways were as foreign to her as hers had been to Lenny and Bernie when they came to Quill’s Station.

  Dear Lord! How he wanted to go to her! But he could not endure the torture of another night like the one before. It had taken all of his willpower to keep from blurting out his love for her, and taking all her sweet woman’s body had to give. There wasn’t the slightest doubt in his mind that she would have surrendered to him. But he was certain that all it would have been for her would have been a painful taking of her maidenhead; and for him, a quick, temporary relief.

  If it should happen, a small voice whispered in a corner of his mind, there would be no possibility of a divorce. If he got her with child, she would be his forever. Daniel firmly shoved the thought aside. He wanted her desperately, but not that way! He thought of her trusting acceptance of him the previous night. She had curled in his arms with only her thin nightdress and his britches between them. In the night she had taken his hand and placed it on her breast, totally unaware that the feeling of her soft breast in his palm sent shock waves to his already painful loins. Early that morning she had turned to him and slept with her face against his neck, her thigh over his, her arm across his chest.

  Daniel looked at the moon riding high in the sky and wished for its swift passage. He looked forward to the dawn of a new day. It couldn’t come quickly enough to suit him. He and Mercy would leave this place, and he would have her all to himself. He would tell her of his love for her and that he wanted nothing more than for her to spend the rest of her life as his wife. If she wanted a wedding to remember, they could be married again by a minister in Evansville. He was determined that they would spend their first night as husband and wife with a complete understanding between them.

  Daniel picked up a limb from the woodpile and began to shave it into kindling. Mercy hadn’t thought of what they faced when they got back to Quill’s Station. As for himself, he didn’t care what people thought, but he knew it was different for a woman. By now Belinda Martin would have spread the news that the two backwoods men who had come riding into town on mules were Mercy’s brothers. That, coupled with the fact that Glenn Knibee would see to it that the whole town knew Daniel had spent the night alone in the house with her was enough to ostracize her. Outside of Eleanor McCourtney and Tennessee, he doubted if there was another woman in town who would dare speak to her. This would hurt her unbearably, and there was no way he could shield her from that hurt.

  An hour later there was enough kindling in the pile at Daniel’s feet to start a dozen fires. His thoughts had turned to George, to Turley Blaine, and to the people on his farm. They would be tilling the soil and putting in the crops. Gavin would be on the lookout for Hammond Perry after George told him what happened at the mill. But Gavin would be busy with his lumber business, and he was sure Perry would give Gavin a wide berth, knowing the big man would kill him if given half a chance.

  The news Edward Ashton had given Daniel about Perry wanting George worried him some. There was only one way to stop a bastard like Hammond Perry, and that was to kill him.

  Some of Daniel’s most frightening memories as a child were of Hammond Perry. He remembered when Perry came to Quill’s Station to take Farr to Vincennes to stand trial for treason. He remembered standing beside Mercy while she cried when the soldiers took Farr away. Then, later, he had heard the story of how Perry had sent men to kill Rain Tallman and to take Eleanor, who at the time was engaged to marry Will Bradford, another man Perry hated. There was nothing the man wouldn’t do for revenge.

  Daniel thought of the Negroes on his farm—Jasper, Gus, and their families, and poor old Jeems and his demented son, Gerrit. They were gentle, good people, and the thought of any of them in the hands of Hammond Perry set his blood to boiling.

  Suddenly tired in mind and body, Daniel sank the ax in the stump and went to the porch. He spread out his blanket and stretched out.

  Thank God, with any luck at all, he and Mercy would be home in three days.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Moonlight shimmered on the waters of the Wabash. The beauty of the night was not only unappreciated but also cursed by the three men in the flat-bottom boat that slid silently beneath the screen of willows lining the pond above the falls that turned the mill wheel.

  “By God! I ain’t likin’ gettin’ in that cold water.”

  “We ain’t gettin’ that nigger no other way, so get in thar.”

  “We’ll drown ’em gettin’ him back in the boat.”

  “God damn you, Knibee. This was yore idea. You told Perry you could get in the mill. Now get yore ass in the water.”

  “What’ll we do if the nigger drowns?”

  “We’ll let him float on downriver ’n’ head fer Saint Louie. Perry ain’t one ta overlook bunglin’. Get on out.”

  “Hang right in close, hear?” Glenn Knibee said to the man at the oars.

  “I hear you. I ain’t deaf.”

  Two of the men slipped silently out of the boat and into the water. After a swim of no more than half a dozen feet, they reached the overhang of the flume that led into the wheel housing. The structure hung over the water, projecting from the side of the mill. The first man took a deep breath, sank beneath the surface of the water, and came up under the housing sill. He waited for the second man to join him, and then they climbed up into the mill. They waited a few minutes to get their breath, then, with Glenn Knibee leading the way, they silently moved up the ladder, into the storage room, and on to the living quarters.

  * * *

  Hammond Perry paced the length of the barroom and back. He paused, glazed at Lyman Sickles, the landlord, and continued his pacing.

  “Are ya wantin’ anythin’, Mr. Perry?”

  “You don’t have anything here I’d spit on, Sickles.”

  The landlord turned his face to hide his resentment and moved behind the bar before he spoke.

  “Ya was glad enough to get the word about Phelps and the woman.”

  “I paid you for it. You didn’t tell me how you knew it was him.”

  “One of my other lodgers recognized him ’n’ the woman. They’re the brats Farrway Quill raised. Then Knibee come in, said Phelps and the woman were goin’ down to Kentucky. The woman’s a looker, a real looker.”

  Sickles stopped talking when Hammond stood in front of him and looked him in the eyes. It was not often that Hammond was able to look down at a man shorter than he was, and he enjoyed doing it.

  “So she’s a looker. You’ve said that a dozen times. If you’re going to talk, tell me something new.”

  Resentment tightened the lines of Sickles’s face again. “Phelps stays as close to her as skin on a sausage. They slept together.”

  “Wouldn’t you, if you got the chance? Hell, that woman of yours looks like she’s been dragged behind a wagon for half a day. Don’t she talk?”

  “Not that I ever heared,” the landlord said dryly.

  “Who was the damn fool who tried to stab Phelps? Stupid son of a bitch got what was coming to him for pulling such a stunt. Why didn’t he shoot him?”

  “I didn’t ask him. He was dead. Looked like he was hit with a rock.”

  “A rock? Shit? Hammond paced to the end of the room and back. “Went down to Kentucky,” he said, as if to himself. “He’ll be coming back this way.”

  The years had not been kind to Hammond Perry. He had the stamp of greed and mal
evolence on his face. Puffy red pouches hung beneath his watery eyes. His hair lay against his scalp in strings. To make up for the loss of hair on his head, he had allowed his sideburns and his whiskers to grow long, which gave him a top-heavy look. He held his thin body ramrod-straight, which made his protruding abdomen all the more pronounced.

  Hammond took a watch from his pocket, flipped open the case, and looked at it. “Midnight,” he murmured.

  “They ort ta be gettin’ back.”

  “How long have you known this fellow, Knibee?”

  “Year or two. He ain’t got no use for Quill or Phelps. I heared Phelps knocked him on his arse a while back.”

  “Good. Good. He’ll be wanting to get even.”

  Another hour passed before a heavy hand pounded on the back door of the inn. The landlord lifted the bar and swung the door back. Two men staggered in, holding George between them. His hands were bound behind his back. A loop around his ankles allowed him to take only short hopping steps.

  “Get that nigger outa here!” Sickles snarled.

  The men ignored Sickles and looked beyond him to Hammond. “We got him, Mr. Perry.”

  “I can see that. Take him to the barn and tie him up.”

  “He’s wet as a drowned rat.”

  “Bein’ wet ain’t goin’ to hurt a nigger none,” Knibee said, and yanked George back toward the door.

  “Wait!” Hammond strode past Sickles. “Slit his drawers. I want to see his dong.”

  George began to struggle when one of the men pulled out a long, thin-bladed knife.

  “Ya best stand still, nigger, or this blade might make a geldin’ of ya.”

  George froze, then flinched when the tip of the knife nicked the skin beneath his pubic hair as it slit open his britches. Humiliated, he had to stand and suffer the indignity of having his private parts examined. He looked at the ceiling and vowed to kill each and every one of these men who prodded and snickered at his manly endowment.