She turned to straighten Charles’ bow tie and her son smiled up at her, excited by this new adventure. She had decided that perhaps she liked her son after all, for he was an obedient boy and he did seem to love her, in spite of the cold way she treated him. She had tried her best to keep him away, but he always came around wanting a hug, like a dog always wanting to be petted even though its master kicks it every time it comes near.
Charles was like that. A sweet boy … too sweet. But children were such a bother, and he had caused her pain when he was born. She tried to love him, but could find no feelings for her son. Perhaps that was because she could see traces of his father, the fat senator, in her son’s eyes. Perhaps that was why she hated him.
Susan also hated the dirty, dusty, hot country through which the stage now bounced and rumbled. This land could ruin a woman’s skin in no time at all. Still, she felt lucky to still be married to the senator. He had forgiven her and had promised that as soon as she reached Santa Fe she could stay in the finest hotel while she supervised the building of their mansion. He had promised she could have any kind of house she wished, and she would make sure it was nothing short of a castle. It would be exciting! Everything she needed would be shipped from the East. The West would be their kingdom and she would be its queen. For that she would put up with the senator. She would simply wait for him to die. At her age, she would still be young and beautiful enough to have her share of men once her husband was gone.
Her thoughts were interrupted by sudden gunshots and war cries, and she frowned and looked out the window of the coach to see half-naked Indians chasing them.
“Comanches!” she heard the driver shout. “What the hell are they doin’ this close to Santa Fe!”
A small troop of soldiers had accompanied them most of the way, but there had been an Indian skirmish a few miles to the north, and with the stage being so close to Santa Fe, the driver had told the soldiers to go ahead and see to the problem. Now only two soldiers accompanied the stage, and before Susan’s horrified eyes, both fell from their mounts in quick succession, arrows in their backs!
The driver whipped the horses into going faster, and the coach lurched forward. Susan screamed and crouched to the floor, leaving her little boy confused and afraid. She was not concerned for his welfare—only her own—and she wondered if the Indians might take the boy in exchange for her own life if it became necessary. That would be a good way to get rid of Charles and save her own skin.
To her, it seemed hours rather than minutes that they were chased, bullets and arrows whizzing by the coach while it rattled and rocked and bounced over the trail. Then Susan heard the driver cry out. Little Charles huddled near his mother between the seats, crying. The shooting continued, as the rifleman hired to accompany the driver continued his duty of fighting the raiding Indians, but there were too many. An arrow pierced his skull, and his body rolled off the coach.
The unattended coach and its horses ran wild, then hit a large rock and flipped over, breaking loose at the tongue while the horses thundered on, chased by some of the Comanches. Susan was tossed against the side of the crashing coach and everything went black. The grand life she had planned to lead in Santa Fe was not to be. Susan Garvey was dead.
Moments later the Comanches reached the coach, to find a little boy standing over his mother crying. They discussed whether or not to steal the boy, but they decided his crying meant he would not make a good warrior. Besides, taking a white boy would bring them much trouble. When they stared down at the woman, they decided her pretty hair would make a fine scalp, and Little Charles watched in horror as they deftly removed his mother’s hair from her head. Then they took the driver’s weapons and stole all the luggage and supplies that were on the coach before setting fire to it.
“Cheyenne!” one of the Comanches said to the little boy. “Say Cheyenne!” The raider laughed. It would be a good joke on the Cheyenne when the little boy told the soldiers it was Cheyenne who had done the raiding. He mounted his horse and rode off with the others.
Little Charles stood beside the burning coach and watched the “Cheyenne” ride away. He hated them for taking his mother’s hair. Tears streamed down his cheeks, and he trembled with hatred and fright. He knew by instinct that his mother would not wake up again, so he watched the Indians until they were out of sight.
Charles Garvey would not forget this day, not for the rest of his life. He knew that he would hate Indians forever … all Indians. Some day he would be big and important like his daddy, and he would make the Indians suffer—especially the Cheyenne!
Twenty
It was one grand migration, a sight that Abigail Monroe would not forget through all the turbulent years that lay ahead of her. The walk to Laramie was like walking toward the light at the end of a tunnel. It was a walk filled with great hope, not only for the Cheyenne, but for the Oglala and Brule Sioux, the Shoshoni, the Arapaho, and the Crow Indians.
Kiowas and Comanches, who feared the Sioux would try to steal their horses, would not attend. They had not yet learned that making a treaty with the Great White Father was more important than warring among the tribes. Those who did head for Laramie were beginning to understand that they must band together and try to forget old grudges, for there was power in numbers. And even though they understood that this treaty primarily would set aside land for the Cheyenne only, they also understood it was the beginning of bargaining with the Great White Father for all tribes. They came to learn, and to try to cooperate with the Great White Father’s plea for the tribes to stop warring among themselves, for they knew that as long as they remained divided, white settlers would find it easier to take their land.
They came from all directions: Shoshoni and Crow from the west, Cheyenne and Arapaho from the south and southeast, the Sioux from the north and east. In great, colorful, impressive tribal order they came, dressed for the occasion in their most honored war paint and bonnets, their ponies painted, their tipis and clothing and faces painted, beads and hairpipes wound beautifully into their glossy black hair, bows and arrows and lances decorated with brilliant feathers.
They did not all arrive at once. The Cheyenne arrived first, and Zeke sold several horses inside the fort for a good price to soldiers and scouts who were eager to acquire these fine mounts. For the first few days Abbie stayed away from the fort, remaining within their tipi, which was staked with those of Swift Arrow’s clan amid the greater circle of tribal dwellings.
It was a happy time for Zeke and Abbie. Four-year-old Little Rock ran wild and free through the camps, playing with the other Indian children, shooting his toy bow and stick arrows, and sometimes riding the pinto pony his father had given him for his very own. Already, Little Rock was as natural on a horse as his father and uncles; and wearing only leggings, with his straight, black hair hanging over the deep brown skin of his shoulders nearly to his waist, Little Rock bore no resemblance to his white mother. He was Cheyenne, totally and completely. He could speak the tongue fluently, as well as his mother’s English, and he was a bright, proud child. When Swift Arrow would take the boy with him to ride, he would tell Little Rock about the warrior ways, and Little Rock would hold up his chin proudly and screech out war cries in his little-boy voice.
Blue Sky, almost two now, still spent some of her time inside her cradleboard, contented as long as the board was situated near her mother. She was a shy, quiet child, insistent on being near Abbie during all of her waking hours, clinging to her mother’s skirts and following her around whenever she was not snug and safe in her cradleboard. She was dark and beautiful, with the kind of beauty that seems to come only to those born of two different races. Her eyes were large and surrounded by long, dark lashes; her tiny face was perfect and fetching, her skin as smooth as satin. To Zeke, she was a vision of perfection. Both his children were the source of his greatest pride and joy, and they were the root of his deepening love for the woman who had delivered them.
Those first three weeks of waiting for t
he arrival of more Indians and for the government men were a time of celebration for the Cheyenne and for Zeke and Abbie, whose pleasure was marred only by the absence of Gentle Woman. Zeke’s mother, was sorely missed, and her death had embittered Swift Arrow’s heart even more, for again the white man’s disease had claimed someone he loved. Zeke and Abbie both feared the trouble that lay ahead because of Swift Arrow’s haughty dislike of most whites, as well as the growing problem of alcohol among the Cheyenne. Red Eagle’s own addiction now seemed permanent, and even the birth of a son by Yellow Moon that summer did nothing to thwart his drinking.
Red Eagle had been expelled from his tipi numerous times after spells of drunkenness when he beat his wife, and all knew it would not be long before poor Yellow Moon would give up and divorce herself from the relationship. Red Eagle was fast becoming an unfit husband, who would rather drink than go and hunt for the game necessary for the feeding and sheltering of his family. Whenever Zeke or Swift Arrow or Black Elk, or even the ruling members of Red Eagle’s warrior society, tried to talk to him about his drinking, Red Eagle would only get angry and want to fight them.
It was a vicious circle of dependence for Red Eagle, one that had been going on for six years and was likely to bring him banishment from his family as well as his warrior society. But Red Eagle seemed concerned only over where his next bottle of whiskey would come from.
For now, Zeke had decided he would not allow Gentle Woman’s death or Red Eagle’s drinking to ruin the pleasant break the trip to Fort Laramie had become for himself and Abbie. In the five years since he had brought his new young bride to his people down on the Arkansas, Abbie had seen mostly hardship. Before that, she had suffered incredible emotional torment at the loss of her family. She had given him two children, still they lived in the tipi she had helped sew with her own hands. She did not have the house he had promised her, for they had both been too involved with helping the People survive and with the dangers of life near the turbulent Santa Fe Trail, where raiding had continued even after the war with Mexico was over. It had been impossible to work steadily on anything; and so, all they had done so far was notch out the ends of the logs for the corner fittings and lay the first two tiers of the foundation logs. This year Comanches had raided them, and Abbie had been taken to Swift Arrow’s camp for protection while Zeke and Dooley had rounded up Zeke’s scattered herd. That had taken most of the spring and summer, and then they had to leave to go to Laramie.
Zeke watched Abbie now, thinking how hard the past five years had been. Yet she remained uncomplaining. At the moment she carried little Blue Sky, who often refused to be put down. Abbie talked softly to her shy, clinging daughter, giving her a kiss and placing her in her cradleboard. Abbie was a good mother, a doting, coddling mother, much like the Cheyenne women. She never raised her voice or grew impatient, and never once had she brought up the fact that she still did not have a house, or a mantel for her clock, or a hearth where she could rock her children. She seemed content now just to be with the People again, and she had been as excited as a child over the trip to Fort Laramie.
Zeke watched her. She was Abbie—just Abbie—the woman-child he had branded and claimed. She had only been fifteen then. Now she was twenty-one, and the lovely child he had claimed was blossoming into a gentle and beautiful woman, who had nearly forgotten what it was like to live as she had been born to live.
It was a mild autumn dusk, and the air smelled fresh and sweet. Zeke felt invigorated by the trip and by his present happiness. At the fort he had seen some men he knew from the days of the rendezvous, and he decided that they and the white soldiers should meet his beloved wife and know the truth. It was time for more than just the Cheyenne and a few white men at Bent’s Fort to know of Abbie’s existence, and time for Abigail Monroe to remember she had white skin.
“Abbie!” he called out to her. She turned quickly, causing the fringes of her doeskin tunic to dance fetchingly. A wave of desire coming over him, he thought that bearing two children had added a pleasing fullness to her figure in just the right places. “Put on that blue dress I bought you back at Bent’s Fort.”
She frowned curiously. “Zeke, it’s surely wrinkled from being folded for so long!” He came closer as she spoke. “The only reason I even have it along is because we had to bring practically all our belongings with us so the Comanche wouldn’t steal our things while we were gone, and—”
He put his fingers to her lips. “You’ve not worn that pretty dress since I bought it for you. Get it out and heat the flat of a skillet and press it.” He looked lovingly at her hair. “And unbraid your hair. Brush it out and pull it back at the sides.” He reached into a small pocket on his buckskin shirt and pulled out two blue ribbons he had purchased secretly for her at the fort. “Here. Tie it back with these.”
She took the ribbons from his hand and, looking at them curiously, met his eyes. “Zeke, I don’t understand.”
“I’m taking my woman into the fort tonight to meet some friends of mine and to show her off to the soldiers. I’m taking my mandolin with me, and me and a man I know there who plays a fiddle are going to make some genuine Tennessee music, and if a scout or a soldier there wants to dance with my woman, he has my permission, long as he stays in my sight and watches how he touches her, because it’s been a long time since my woman danced to white man’s music and whirled her skirts and showed off just how pretty she is.”
She reddened and looked down at the ribbons again. “Zeke, we don’t have to—”
He reached out and gently lifted her chin. “Yes, we do. We’ll take the young ones with us, and everyone will see our little brown babies and understand that you and me are man and wife and live in two worlds. And every last one of them will respect you or answer to me!”
Her eyes began to show their excitement. “Oh, Zeke, I haven’t dressed that way for so long! I … I don’t even know if that dress fits me!” She put a hand to her bosom when she said it, and she suddenly blushed, realizing she had filled out in the bodice; Zeke had bought the dress before Little Rock had been born. Zeke flashed the handsome smile that made her blush even deeper.
“If it’s a little snug, you’ll just look prettier,” he told her.
She pushed at him and put her hands to her hot cheeks. Their eyes held and hers filled with love for her gentle half-breed husband, whose knife and ruthlessness were feared by so many men. It seemed impossible sometimes that the man who wielded the knife was the same man who bedded her so gently.
“Will you wear the white doeskin shirt that makes you look so handsome?” she asked him.
He grinned almost sheepishly. “I’ll wear it for you.”
“And promise to play the mandolin and sing for me?”
“I promise.”
Their eyes held a moment longer, and then she dashed off to dig out the blue dress.
Blue Sky started to whimper and Zeke pulled her from her cradleboard, tossing her into the air and making her giggle. The child was content with her father, whose strong arms always comforted her when she was afraid.
“Don’t cry, my little Blue Sky,” Zeke told her. “Tonight we are going to take you and your brother to meet some of your mother’s people, and they all will see my beautiful wife and children.” He swung her around to sit on his shoulders. “Let’s go find Little Rock. I’ll bet my little warrior is off riding his pony again!”
Lt. Daniel Monroe sat down to his desk to work. He had just ridden into Fort Laramie that morning, straight from Fort Leavenworth, where for the past six months he had been on special assignment recruiting men for the Western Army. He was finally back at Laramie, the place he now considered home. He had learned much about the Plains Indians since he had been stationed here, and he liked Wyoming Territory … and the Indians. He was proud of his new gold second lieutenant’s bar. He had worked hard to earn his rank, and the breast of his uniform also sported the gold medal he had earned in the Mexican War. It was set off by a bright green-, gold- and red-str
iped ribbon. He was happy here, his feelings of accomplishment marred only by the fact that he still had not found his half-blood brother.
Danny had not gone out yet to meet the leaders of the Cheyenne and Arapaho or those of the Sioux who now surrounded Fort Laramie by the thousands. The sight was an impressive one as he rode in that morning, and it was more than a little frightening. For the Indians, angry and troubled, were a passionate people, quick to defend their honor. Danny had spent a good share of the day going over with his men what their instructions were in case there was trouble. Under no circumstances was one shot to be fired without orders. That was the first rule.
“One shot could excite them into an all-out state of confusion and lead to more trouble,” he had told his men earlier. “We are here to talk peace, not to create a senseless war.” His men had listened and would obey, for although their lieutenant seemed much too young to be an officer, he had a knack for winning a man’s respect. Most of them knew about the brave act he had committed down in Mexico that had earned him his first promotion. In these Western lands, a man was not surprised by anything that he saw, including a youthful officer with medals on his chest.
Danny began signing some papers for government issue of Army supplies, but he couldn’t stop wondering about all the unrest brewing with the Indians, let alone all of the other problems that necessitated a buildup of the Western Army. He sat back and pondered for a moment on the lawlessness of this land that was filling up with prostitutes and outlaws and gamblers, land-hungry profiteers and cheating traders, and renegade Mexican outlaws. Now there were gangs who dealt in gun smuggling and the slave-trading of women. Such outlaws were running rampant, raiding supply trains and feeding off of others, selling guns and women to Mexicans for gold. There was a rumor that the leader of one of the most notorious of these outlaw gangs was a woman, an Indian woman whose beauty had been marred when she’d had the letter Z carved into both her cheeks. This was an intriguing tale and probably true, for many had seen her, and many had suffered one of her vicious raids. It was amazing that a woman could be at the head of cruel outlaws, but in the West, nothing was truly surprising.
Ride the Free Wind Page 40
