They made slow, pleasurable, tender love, and again she was struck with the wonder of it, and pitied women who had never known such ecstasy. Afterward they dropped off to sleep in each other’s arms, and she dreamed that they were free and warm, that there was plenty of food, and that the four of them had become a family.
It was already past daylight when she awoke and sat up. “I’m sorry.” She looked at Yellow Jacket, who squatted by the fire, grim-faced and silent. Funny, he held a flag made of that scrap of her white petticoat. “Where are the children?”
He stared into the fire. “I’ve gotten an old woman to take charge of them.”
“But I want to look after them. I feel like they’re my children now.” She stood up and ran her hand through her tousled hair. “Do you think we’ll make it to Kansas today?”
“You aren’t going.” He shook his head and stood up slowly. She could read nothing in his rugged, closed face. “Twilight, when I rode away yesterday, I went to the rebels to meet with Captain Wellsley.”
“What?”
“He’s willing to do anything to get you back.”
“You’re—you’re talking about trading me?” She felt both shocked and betrayed.
“Mrs. Dumont,” he began, and his voice was cold, “I’ve made an offer to trade you for food and supplies. I wanted to get ammunition, but they wouldn’t give that.”
She tried to speak, and for a moment nothing came out. He wasn’t taking her with him. He had betrayed her. “Are you telling me that I’m nothing but a hostage after all?”
He nodded, turning his face away so that she could not see his expression. “It’s a big ransom. My people need the food and supplies, and he was eager to trade for you.”
“Why, you . . . !” She slapped him hard, the sound ringing through the cold dawn.
“If you were a man, I’d kill you for that.” He reached up to touch his reddened cheek, his eyes blazing yet sad.
She couldn’t stop the flood of angry tears. “You’ve seduced me, made me think you cared, and it was only—”
“What better trick to keep you from running away?” He turned and began to saddle his horse.
“I hate you for that!” she screamed.
He winced, then continued to saddle up and tied the white flag to his saddle. “We have to leave now. Our rendezvous is for midmorning, and this exchange is all that’s keeping the troops from attacking our stragglers this morning.”
She had never felt as angry and betrayed as she did at this moment. “All right,” she snapped, “at least I know it’s not only white men who speak with forked tongues.”
He winced and, for a long minute, said nothing. “Here, mount up,” he said finally. “They’ll be waiting.”
She wanted to storm at him, hit him, scratch his face, but there was no point now. With a sigh, she ignored his outstretched hand and climbed up on the horse. He swung up before her. She sat stiff, making sure their two bodies did not touch. In the early morning fog, she could see shadowy shapes as the beaten, hungry Indians took the trail again, heading north. In spite of the misery, she had felt one with them and longed to be with them when they reached the freedom of Kansas, now only a few miles away.
He clucked to his horse, and they started through the brush, headed back south, carrying the ragged white flag made from her tattered petticoat.
She should be thrilled and delighted that she was being rescued to return to the life she had before. That had been no life at all; she realized that now. Yellow Jacket had said the captain wanted her. She could be a rich society lady in Austin, with stylish clothes, a big house, and a fine carriage. More than that, she would have wealth and security. Somehow, none of that mattered now.
After a while, they rode into a clearing, where Captain Wellsley waited with a big mule loaded with supplies. He looked anxiously at Twilight. “Mrs. Dumont, are you well?”
“I’m fine.” She slid from the horse and stepped across the circle.
“You came alone?” Yellow Jacket looked around.
“I told you I would,” the officer said, “and I’m a man of honor.”
“I know you are,” Yellow Jacket said from his horse. “That is the only reason I came.”
“Just a minute!” Harvey Leland stepped out suddenly from behind a tree. “I decided to invite myself along.”
The captain looked shocked. “Damn you, Leland, you weren’t invited to this exchange. Believe me, Yellow Jacket, I didn’t—”
“I know.” The Indian glared at Harvey. “I’ve had dealings with the Indian agent before.”
Harvey stepped out into the circle and tried to put his arm around Twilight. “Oh, my dear sister, I’ve been so worried about you.” He took off his coat and put it around her shoulders.
She pulled away from him in distaste. “I’m all right, Harvey. I wasn’t mistreated.”
“Dirty savages,” Harvey snarled, and made a signal. Immediately, Clem Rogers and a dozen Confederate soldiers, all well armed, rose up behind every boulder and tree.
Yellow Jacket looked around. “I’ve been betrayed.”
The captain’s face paled. “I swear to you, I didn’t—”
“Of course you didn’t,” Harvey grinned. “I went to the colonel, and he gave me the troops to follow you.”
“Well,” said the captain, “as senior officer here, these troops are under my command. Lower your rifles, men.”
The men looked startled but obeyed his order.
Harvey swore loud and long. “Captain, are you loco? Surely you aren’t just gonna let this savage ride out of here with this big load of valuable supplies.”
The captain nodded. “Yes, I am. I gave him my word, and I think I got the best of the deal.” His pale eyes turned to look at Twilight, betraying how he felt about her. Now he walked over and handed Yellow Jacket the lead rope of the mule. “This is enough to get some of your people to Kansas.”
“But those are my supplies!” Harvey wailed.
“Oh, shut up, Harvey,” Twilight snapped. Her spunk surprised herself almost as much as it surprised her stepbrother. “You’ve cheated his people out of more than enough to pay for those things.”
Yellow Jacket smiled at her as he took the lead rope, but she did not smile back. Instead, she looked away. She had thought he loved her, and he had traded her for a load of blankets and supplies. At that moment, she hated him so bad, she wanted to kill him. She put her cold hands into the pockets of Harvey’s coat, touched something, and brought it out with a cry of surprise. A broken bracelet of blue beads. “Where on earth . . . ?”
Yellow Jacket jerked up, stared at the bracelet. “That belonged to my niece. It disappeared the night she died.”
Twilight turned to stare at Harvey, and at that moment, the guilty look on his fat face told her the truth. “You murdered her, didn’t you?”
“I didn’t mean to,” he whined. “She was expectin’ a baby and wanted me to marry—”
“You rotten . . . !” The big warrior’s hand went instinctively for a weapon, but he had come to this meeting unarmed.
Twilight saw Harvey’s plump hand go under his vest, and the silver flash of a pistol even as she dove for it. “Yellow Jacket, dear one, look out!”
She caught Harvey’s wrist, and they struggled for the gun as Yellow Jacket and the captain watched helplessly. At that moment, she realized it didn’t matter what Yellow Jacket had done—she loved him and would do whatever it took to protect him, even if Harvey killed her.
They struggled for the pistol, and a shot rang out. Harvey’s fat face froze in shock. He paused, let go of the weapon, and it tumbled to the ground as he grabbed for his belly and blood ran out between his fingers. She backed away in horror.
“At ease, men,” the captain shouted to the soldiers as he ran forward and picked up the pistol.
Yellow Jacket, on his great horse, hesitated. “All right, Captain, you’ve got me.”
“Oh, Captain Wellsley, please,” Twilight implored, “let him g
o. He’s done nothing but protect me, and I love him.”
“Don’t listen to her,” Yellow Jacket shouted. “She’s out of her mind with shock. Take her away with you.”
The captain didn’t seem to hear him. He looked from Yellow Jacket to the weeping Twilight. “You—you love him?”
“I love him,” she declared, strong and self-reliant now. “Please let him go. I’ll go back with you—anything—just let him go.”
“No, she doesn’t!” Yellow Jacket protested. “She’d make you a good wife, Captain—”
“Mrs. Dumont, do you speak the truth?” Wellsley asked.
She nodded, too overcome with emotion to speak. “Let Yellow Jacket return to his people, and I’ll go with you,” she said. “I promise I’ll make you a good wife.”
The captain looked at the pistol in his hand and seemed to consider. If he brought one of the Indian leaders in, he’d be a hero and he’d still get the girl. If he let him go, his troops might talk, and sooner or later he’d be dishonorably discharged for freeing an enemy.
Time seemed to stand still for a heartbeat as the captain made his decision. He looked at her with tears in his eyes. “It’s obvious you belong with Yellow Jacket. Now, you two take your supplies and get out of here before I change my mind.”
Twilight could hardly believe what she heard. “What—what aboutHarvey?”
The captain looked at the dead man on the ground. “Since he surely killed Pretty, I reckon justice has been served. And you, Mrs. Dumont—I knew your husband, so I figure you deserve a better man.”
She looked at him, a question in her eyes, but he shook his head. “You don’t want to know.”
With a cry of relief, she ran to her warrior, and he lifted her up on the horse before him. She put her arms around his waist and hugged him as if she would never let go.
The captain sighed and stuck the pistol in his belt. “I know when Colonel Cooper finds out about this, I’ll face court-martial—”
“About what?” Clem Rogers grinned. “We didn’t see nothin’, did we, boys?”
The troops grinned and shook their heads. “Nobody liked Harvey Leland.”
The captain looked up at Yellow Jacket. “We may yet meet on the field of battle, but I hope not. Now, take your woman and your supplies and go with the others. If you hurry, you should make the Kansas border this afternoon before the Confederate troops can catch up with you.”
Twilight looked down at him. “Thank you, Captain.”
He nodded. “I can’t say that I didn’t wish things hadn’t turned out differently, Mrs. Dumont, but everyone in Austin knows me, and if you should ever change your mind—”
“I won’t.” She said it with stubborn determination, so unlike the pliant, shy woman she had been only weeks before.
Yellow Jacket raised his hand and slowly saluted the officer. “You’re a man of honor,” he said softly. “It renews my faith that someday our two peoples might live in peace.”
The captain returned his salute. “Good luck.”
Yellow Jacket took the mule’s lead rope and turned toward the north.
Twilight was leaving all the best that white civilization had to offer, but all that mattered to her was the man who rode with her. For him, she would sacrifice everything as long as they could be together. They would rejoin the children as a family. Up ahead lay Kansas and freedom. Up ahead lay a life with Yellow Jacket. It was more than enough. She didn’t look back as they rode out.
PART TWO
Jim Eagle’s (Wohali’s) Story
Chapter 13
Army headquarters, June 6, 1864
“You realize, don’t you, Miss Grant, that if you are caught, you may be shot?” The major turned away from his office window and stared at her.
“I—I understand. That’s usually what they do to spies, isn’t it?” April took a deep breath and reached for a lace handkerchief from the bodice of her pale blue dress. What had she let herself in for, and was it too late to back out?
“Yes.” The officer ran his fingers through his gray beard. “I’m glad you’re so strong for our cause.”
Cause? She didn’t give a fig for either side’s cause. “I was promised there’d be a big reward. . . .”
He frowned at her in evident disapproval. “Reward? Yes, of course. That is, if you get out alive and get the information we need.” He paced the small, cluttered office. “As I said before, we’re having a lot of bad luck in Indian Territory lately, which makes us suspect we have an informant among our troops.”
“A soldier?” She listened to the sounds of men drilling on the parade ground outside.
He shrugged. “We have no way of knowing; that’s where you come in. It could be anyone: a soldier, a scout, a trader, even a camp follower—someone is obviously passing vital information to the enemy.”
April chewed her lip. This was sounding more and more dangerous. The money was no good if she didn’t live to spend it. “When I heard you were looking for a volunteer, I had no idea I might have to go into the Nations.”
“We’d rather we had a man, but we didn’t find one with your qualifications.” He sat down in the chair behind his cluttered desk. “You’re Cherokee, aren’t you? We wanted someone who knows the landscape and speaks the language.”
She didn’t like to admit that she had some Indian blood. “Half-breed,” they had called her at that snooty Miss Priddy’s Female Academy in Boston. “My name is April Grant,” she reminded him in an icy tone.
“Have it your way, but our sources tell us your Cherokee name is Kawoni Giyuga and you were born and raised in Indian Territory until five years ago, when your white father took you north. Your parents are now both dead.”
Kawoni. “April” in the Cherokee language, the month of her birth. “That’s right,” she admitted.
“You’re tall and slender for a girl, and you have a deeper voice than most, so maybe you could pass yourself off as a common soldier.”
“A soldier!” She stood up, and the hoops swayed under her pale blue dress. “Surely you jest.”
“Didn’t you learn to ride and shoot in your younger days? And you do speak Cherokee?”
She was almost twenty now. Her youth in the Indian Territory seemed a century away, and she didn’t want to be reminded of it. She swallowed back her trepidation, reminding herself that with the reward, she could buy respectability in the white world and turn her back on her Cherokee heritage forever. “All that’s true,” she admitted grudgingly. She studied the officer, wondering if she could trust him. He might have been handsome except that he had a crooked nose and a big mole on his right cheek.
The major paused to light a cigar. “We’ll find a way to sneak you into the Nations and issue you uniforms from both sides. If you do not turn up anything from one, change uniforms, go over to the other, and keep your ears open. The only clue we might have is an X.”
“An X?”
He nodded. “It seems to have a special meaning, but we aren’t certain what it is. If you suspect someone, try drawing that letter and see if you get any response. Above all, be careful and trust no one.”
April wavered. Did she really need money this badly? Yes, to live like a respectable white girl named April Grant and not be ridiculed for being a half-breed Injun anymore. She went to the window and looked toward the troops drilling outside. The weather was warm, and the scent of the roses beneath the window mingled with the smell of sweating horses and dust from the army barracks. “If I find the spy?”
The officer took a deep puff of his cigar, and the rich scent mingled with the others drifting on the warm air. “Miss Grant, the less you know, the better, in case . . .” His voice trailed off.
“In case what?” She whirled to confront him.
He chewed his cigar and studied her, and seemed to decide she could take the news. “There’s always a possibility that you might be exposed, and—and the enemy might do whatever it takes to find out how much you know.”
Rape and torture, she thought, and shuddered. “You mean, before they shoot me?”
“I told you it was chancy at best.” He didn’t meet her gaze, obviously embarrassed to be sending a mere girl into a dangerous situation. “I will sneak into the Territory myself in a few weeks and find a way to contact you. When you think you have vital information, find me and pass it on. Then we’ll try to get you out.”
“Try?”
“This is war, Miss Grant, and the only thing that matters is winning. The enemy has had bad luck lately. Have you heard about Cold Harbor?”
She shook her head. The name meant nothing to her.
“Cold Harbor, Virginia”—the officer smiled with satisfaction—“happened only a couple of days ago. Big defeat for the enemy; seven thousand causalities in less than ten minutes. A few more battles like that and we’ll win this war fast.”
Seven thousand causalities. A staggering number. And her death might make it seven thousand and one. No one would care, since she was all alone in the world. “When do I start?”
The officer took a puff and stared at her. “Right away. We’ll sneak you into the Union fort first. After a few weeks, I’ll be joining you there with further instructions. It’s possible we might ask you to desert and go to the Confederate side. General Stand Watie’s Confederate Cherokee Mounted Rifles are in southern Indian Territory, and with your background, you can blend in.”
She hated to be continually reminded of her shameful Cherokee heritage. When she had her hands on that reward money, she would turn her back on her past and live like a rich, respectable white lady in Boston or New York, with fine clothes and a fancy carriage. The girls who had snubbed her at Miss Priddy’s Academy would be begging for invitations to her social events after the war when April was married to a rich businessman. “This whole thing seems so seamy.”
He raised one eyebrow at her. “Anyone who would work as a spy, not for a cause, but for money, is pretty seamy.”
She whirled on him, dark eyes flashing. “Sir, are you insulting me?”
“Let’s say I doubt the character of anyone who thinks only of money.”
To Tame A Rebel Page 17
