by Karen Noland
An hour of agonized riding and still there had been no sign. Was the search futile? The full moon cast a glow over the landscape that aided the process though the clouds still obscured the moonlight from time to time, causing him to pause and wait for additional light. Every rustle tickled the hollow of his ear, urging him to peer deeper into the bushes. The night sounds became a haunting chorus, taunting him with the promise of finding her just over the next rise, around the next bend, but still he could not find her.
Voices. Reining in the colt he listened. Surely he had heard a voice off to the left. Staring transfixed into the trees, he waited, stilling his very breathing, he listened. The soft hooting of an owl, the scurry of a rodent in the brush, only the night sounds surrounded him. Expelling his breath in rush, he urged his horse on yet again.
How many miles had he come? Jake had said it was nearly eight miles to the marker. He had covered perhaps half that distance. The pale light of the moon was coming more from the west with every step. A permanent chill had settled in his bones, fear permeated every cell, his head pounding, fingers numb, still he rode on, searching.
Blood. A small pool of blood lay before him on the road drying and clotting in the moonlight. Streaks of brown and red gore showed plainly where the victim had crawled or been dragged off the road to the west. Shredded leaves and mangled branches gave their own mute testimony to the passing.
Swallowing the fear that rose within his throat, Luke dismounted in one swift, fluid motion. The buckskin followed Luke into the trees reluctantly, snorting at the coppery scent of blood, eyes wide with fear. Not fifteen feet from the road, they emerged into a small clearing.
She lay sprawled beneath a scrub oak, blood soaking the jacket and trickling from her mouth. Dried gore matted her hair. She made no movement, no sign of life was evident in the still form. A moment, frozen in time, Luke’s heart stopped in paralyzing fear. The colt behind him, already filled with a sense of panic, sat back on his haunches at the sight of her body, jerking the reins from Luke’s hand. The sudden movement jarred him from his dazed stupor.
“Whoa, boy, whoa,” he said to the quaking horse. Picking up the reins he looped them securely around a stout tree. Turning to Kate, he knelt beside her lifeless body. Her skin was cool, but still held the resiliency of life. Placing his fingers on her neck in a feather-light touch, he felt for life. Barely breathing, he waited, moving his fingers as he sought the artery near the side of her neck. There, it was there, he could just feel the blood still pulsing faintly beneath her skin.
Now what? What could he do here, in the middle of the night, in the cold? He knew so little about healing. He had dug a slug out of a cowboy’s arm one rainy night years ago. But this was the woman he loved, her lifeblood seeping from her in an inexorable tide. Panic began to overcome him. He was going to sit here and watch her die, there was nothing he could do. Luke had never felt so utterly alone and helpless in his life. The fear held him in iron bands, constricting his chest, binding his heart.
Breathing in deep ragged breaths, he closed his eyes and turned his face to heaven. “God, oh God, why? I am coming to You, broken, helpless, humble. There is nothing I can do. Only You can cleanse me, Lord. Only You can heal her. She has been Yours for so long, and only now do I truly realize what that means. To be wholly yours, I have to sacrifice every earthly desire, trust You, stop relying on my strength and allow You to work through me. God, save her, save me.”
The shriek of a night-hunting hawk rent the air. Luke’s eyes flew open. A man stepped from the shadows, his dark gaze searching Luke’s face before falling on the woman still motionless on the ground.
Luke’s hand reached instinctively for a gun he no longer wore.
“She lives,” the man pronounced.
Luke nodded. Though wary of the stranger, something about him told Luke that he meant no harm.
“Tochoway?” Luke whispered.
The man nodded. “She has spoken of me.”
“Yes.”
Tochoway knelt beside Kate. Removing his woolen jacket, he placed it over her cold body. Gentle fingers probed the wound on her head, then moved to her chest. Lifting her slightly, he explored her back. Nodding, he turned his gaze on Luke.
“How bad is she?” Luke asked.
“The bullet has gone through. That is good. She has lost much blood, and is too cold. We need to move her to shelter now.”
“Bullet? But who would...” Luke trailed off, realization dawning, anger rose to replace the fear
“The blood still flows,” Tochoway observed, waving off Luke’s concern. “We must stop it.”
Jolted into action. Luke unstrapped the bedroll from the buckskin, still pawing the ground where he was tied. Opening the roll he retrieved several cotton rags and a green wool blanket.
Tochoway took the rags. Folding them into tight bundles, he placed them over both entry and exit wounds to staunch the flow. Luke laid aside his jacket and removed his muslin shirt. The icy wind raised chill bumps along his exposed skin. Ignoring the cold, he tore the shirt into long strips to bind the makeshift bandages into place. Working together the men shifted her enough to get the strips bound tightly around her, stemming the flow of her blood.
Tochoway raised his head, listening to the wind. “Come.”
“How?” Luke asked. “She’ll never survive the ride all the way back to Providence.”
As they rolled Kate gently into the relative warmth offered by the blanket, a groan escaped her.
“Shhh, it’s going to be all right. You’re going to be fine,” Luke whispered to her, not knowing whether she heard or not. His heart ached, but he knew they had to work quickly in order to have any chance of saving her.
Tochoway picked up the limp form, cradling her within the shelter of his arms. With no more than a glance toward Luke, he set off through the trees. Luke untied the reins of the colt and followed behind.
The man ahead of him traveled swiftly and silently even with the burden he carried. Luke was hard pressed to keep up, and more than once thought he had lost him. Each time, Tochoway paused and waited for him to reappear.
After an hour of travel this way, Luke found himself in a valley, surrounded on three sides by rocky canyon walls. A lake shimmered with ethereal beauty under the waning moonlight ahead of them. Tochoway stood before the door of a simple log cabin, all but hidden in a copse of trees. Tying the colt to a fence rail near the cabin, Luke hurried over to open the door.
Pushing through the door, Tochoway laid Kate on the rough bed occupying one corner of the small room. A stove glowed in the opposite corner with the fading radiance of banked coals.
“Build the fire up. We will need water heated.” Tochoway said.
Luke complied, finding the wood and kindling near the door of the cabin. A kettle stood atop the stove, already filled with water. As the fire caught and began to warm the room, Luke moved the kettle over the heat and waited, watching Tochoway minister to Kate’s wounds.
“The bleeding has slowed, perhaps stopped, but the wounds are bad. There is a woman in the village skilled in healing. I will bring her.” Before Luke could respond, Tochoway vanished.
Luke poured warm water from the kettle into a basin and carried it to the bed. He set the bowl on the floor, and retrieved one of the two chairs from the table, which along with a chest and one wall cabinet, made up the only other furnishings within the austere cabin.
Tochoway had left a cloth over her forehead. Taking the rag, Luke dipped it in the water and wrung it out. He daubed the wound on the side of her head, cleaning away the blood and dirt to reveal a small cut, some minor swelling and bruising. Another rinse in the soothing water, and he began to wash the dirt from her face. Her eyes fluttered, opening for a brief moment, but unable to focus, they closed again. She moaned in pain, trying to get up.
“Shhh, Kate, lie still. You’re going to be all right,” Luke said, pushing her gently down.
She collapsed back on the bed and lay so stil
l that a moment of panic seized Luke, until he saw the gentle rise and fall of her breast with each shallow breath.
The chill in the cabin was slowly dissipating as the fire warmed the air. The stars still twinkled through the window, though the eastern sky was beginning to lighten. The Insleys would be waking soon. What would they think? Jake would find Kate’s horse in the barn and Luke missing. Worry began gnawing at him even as he bathed Kate’s face.
The sound of horses approaching stirred him from his reverie. Moments later, the latch moved, and the door swung in silently. Tochoway was followed by a woman bundled in a bright blanket and two or three shawls. Her black hair was streaked with silver, but her bearing was erect, her eyes bright and clear.
A few phrases were exchanged between the Tochoway and the woman in a language Luke could not discern. As the woman removed her outer garments, Tochoway returned to Kate, watching her shallow breathing with an immutable gaze.
The Comanche woman paid scant attention to Luke as she checked the kettle on the stove, removed a bowl from the cupboard and began measuring out herbs from a pouch at her waist. Luke watched in fascination and growing concern as the woman poured steaming water over the concoction and took it to Kate’s bedside. A few more words were exchanged, and Tochoway motioned Luke to follow him from the cabin. Glancing at Kate and the woman standing beside her, Luke reluctantly followed Tochoway through the narrow door.
Gray skies lightened the eastern horizon as a bleak dawn approached. The clouds lay low in the sky, and a damp chill penetrated even through Luke’s heavy jacket. The two men stared at the lake, as ripples blown by the wind washed the silver shore.
Luke watched the light play against the waves as the pale morning light began to break. Tochoway stood at the rail, gaze fixed on a distant point. In that instant, the realization struck Luke fully.
“You’re in love with her,” he stated flatly.
Tochoway made no answer, but a tremor ran through his jaw as it tightened, and his focus remained fixed for a long, tense moment.
“Why?” Luke asked. “Why haven’t you told her?”
Drawing a deep breath, Tochoway began to speak in a quiet tone, “There is a Comanche legend. A small girl, She-Who-Is-Alone, lost both parents in a great famine. The rains did not come, the people were afraid. The only thing she had left was the beautiful cornhusk doll made by her mother and decorated by her father with the blue feathers of the jay.
“The medicine man prayed to the Great Father to send the life-giving rains, but still they did not come. She-Who-Is-Alone told her precious doll that all would be well, surely the medicine man would know what to do.
“Finally one day the medicine man went alone to the mountain. He fasted and prayed and sought the will of the Great Father. When he returned, he told the people that they were becoming selfish and forgetting the bounty was provided by the Great Father. They were to sacrifice their most valuable possession in a fire, repent of their selfish ways, then the rains would come.
“The people grumbled among themselves. ‘Surely, he does not mean my bow,’ said the warrior. ‘How then would I hunt to provide meat?’ And the maiden said, ‘I must have my blanket to stay warm. He could not mean for me to give that up.’ So the people drifted off, saying that tomorrow was another day.
“She-Who-Is-Alone looked down at the wonderful doll in her hand, the only thing she had left in the world. ‘It is me, I must do this,’ she said to herself. With tears in her eyes, she gathered some small sticks, took a burning ember from the village fire, and began the long walk to the mountain alone.
“There she built a pyre, laid her precious doll atop, and with a trembling hand, laid the fire brand against the dry sticks. She watched as the doll burned in a swirl of blue smoke. Then, exhausted, the girl fell asleep upon the mountain.
“When she awoke the land was covered in a carpet of beautiful blue flowers the very color of the jay feathers, and the rains came.” Tochoway turned toward Luke. “She-Who-Is-Alone did not want others to endure the loss she had suffered. The Heavenly Father sent a son, knowing that he would die in agony, so others could be spared the pain of eternal death. My sacrifice is a small one, knowing the prejudice she would suffer as my wife or my lover. I have endured the heartbreak of being caught between two peoples, I will not ask that of her.”
Howling winds died with the coming dawn, stilling the turbulent lake. The rising sun broke through the gray clouds, sending shafts of radiant light to illuminate the peaceful waters. The ensuing silence was broken by the soft rustle of a woman’s skirt as the cabin door opened. Tochoway and Luke turned expectantly, and the dark-haired woman stood aside as she motioned for them to enter.
The cabin was warmed by the glowing stove where a kettle simmered, wafting a soothing herbal fragrance into the air. Tochoway strode across the room to gaze upon the woman laying still upon the bed.
“Weakeah?” he asked.
“She sleeps now. Perhaps she will live,” Weakeah answered in softly accented English as she busied herself at the table folding cloths and sorting herbs into her deerskin pouch.
Luke approached the bedside. Kate’s pale face was clean, all traces of blood wiped away. The wound on her temple had been skillfully cleaned and covered with a light bandage. She was covered by a colorful wool blanket that rose and fell with her steady breathing. Her clothing lay in a pile at the foot of the bed, dried blood crusting the jacket and blouse.
Finished with her tasks at the table, Weakeah walked over to retrieve the clothes, and disappeared through the cabin door.
“Weakeah will clean and mend them if she can,” Tochoway said.
Luke nodded, numb not only from the shock and cold, but from Tochoway’s revelations as well. Would he ever be the man Tochoway was? Did he even deserve a woman like Kate? She had said she loved him, would marry him. Was it really only yesterday they had watched the sun rise over Providence together and the future had held such bright promise?
Kate moaned softly from the bed. She became restless, trying to throw the covers back. Tochoway reached out a hand to stroke her hair, calm her, then glancing at Luke, he stepped back with an indication that the rightful place did not belong to him.
Luke knelt beside the bed reaching for her hand as it flashed from beneath the blanket. “Kate, hush now, you need to rest. I’m here. You’re going to be all right now,” he comforted her. As he spoke, she grew still, her eyes flew open, searching, wary, unfocussed. Kate’s head turned from side to side as she fought toward consciousness. Closing her eyes with a deep sigh, she sank back upon the bed into a fitful sleep.
Luke stroked her hand and arm now laying atop the blanket. Puzzled as his fingers felt the unfamiliar scarring he glanced down at the bare skin of her forearm. Normally hidden beneath the long sleeves she always wore, the livid scars ran from a few inches behind her wrist to just before her elbow. Luke stared at them intently, wondering where they had come from, and why she never mentioned them. Did she think he would be repulsed by them?
“Puha,” Tochoway said in a low voice.
“What?”
“Puha,” Tochoway repeated. “I cannot find a way to say it in your tongue. It is a Nuumu concept for great personal honor, bravery and healing power.”
Luke nodded, still looking at the scars. “But, how...”
Tochoway shook his head. “She has suffered much,” he continued, his voice deep with emotion. “Yet she is strong, brave, ready to face any challenge life may have for her. Through faith, she has found peace, and an inborn willingness to serve others. Now she deserves happiness.”
Luke turned to face Tochoway. In his eyes, Luke could see the love this man felt for Kate. In that instant, Luke resolved to honor the sacrifice and all it meant.
***
Cold, she was so cold. Why wouldn’t the cold go away? The swirling darkness came again enveloping her brain in a foggy haze. She had to - had to - what? There was something very important she had to do, why couldn’t she focus?
The pain, that was it! If the pain would just go away, she could think. A voice! Luke! Yes, it was Luke. What was he saying? Praying? Why? They had to find Jo and tell her the news. Jo would be so happy. Kate tried to rise, but the pain came again. Darkness.
She moaned softly as she realized the cold was no longer so intense. She was moving, cradled against someone warm. She felt safe, so safe now. The scent of leather and male sweat filled her nostrils as she tried to breathe deeply, but the pain struck again as her lungs filled with air. Black hair brushed her face as her savior bent his head to quiet her. Tochoway? Where was Luke? She knew she had heard him, where had Luke gone? Struggling to see and understand, the pain overwhelmed her and the dark haze claimed her senses again.
She fought through the black void as though it were a tangible foe. Luke was stroking her head, she felt him, heard him, she was sure it was Luke. If only she could tell him she loved him. Willing her eyes to open she saw blurs of light, but the pain was too intense. Her eyes closed. Trying to speak, the only sound that escaped was a gasp of pain.
“Shhh, Kate, lie still. You’re going to be all right.” Luke’s voice penetrated through the haze of pain clouding her brain. Claiming the words as a promise, Kate lay back, giving herself over to the darkness, no longer trying to fight it.
Kate coughed as the bitter herbal drink trickled down her throat. A firm hand held her head up while another poured the warm concoction into her mouth. Forcing her eyes open, Kate could see the soft, dark features of an Indian woman. Her liquid brown eyes held tender compassion. Kate nodded, finished drinking the tea and slipped again into a restful sleep.
The heat was suffocating her. Too hot - fire, get away from the fire. Kate fought to throw off the confining weight of the covers. Why couldn’t she move? Why was it so hot? Groping with her hand, she tried to get away. Voices, Luke?
