CHAPTER
* 9 *
Cherish moaned and flung out her arms. She wanted to open her eyes, but her lids felt as if two lead weights were pressing down on them. She tossed her head from side to side, gasping for breath. Something hard took her shoulders and shook her. She struggled to sit up, but her bones were too heavy and her body felt like one giant ache.
As if from a distance, she heard Sloan’s voice. “Wake up, Cherish!”
She fought her way out of the uneasy sleep and managed to push herself into a sitting position. Her neck hurt, her mouth was dry, and strands of her hair had pulled out of her braids and stuck to her cheeks. Drugged with sleep, she finally became adjusted to the darkness and could see that Sloan was kneeling beside her on the blanket.
“Are you awake?” he asked.
“I’m awake.”
“There’s a storm coming. We’ve got to be ready for it.”
A flash of lightning lit up the clearing. Instantly, Cherish scrambled to her feet.
“What shall we do?”
“We’ve got to keep our foodstuff and the gunpowder dry.” He began stuffing everything in his pack except their two blankets. “We don’t have much time. Stay here.”
“Sloan . . . but—”
“No buts. Stay here.” Sloan barked out the orders.
Lightning forked out, overhead this time. Cherish was almost knocked down by a gust of wind that swept through the trees. Panic seized her and she dived for their few possessions. She grabbed her shawl and her moccasins as Sloan returned, almost floundering under the weight of a log which he placed against the rock wall. He picked up the rifle and shoved it into her hands.
“Hold this. Put it under your skirt if necessary to keep it dry.” Then he was gone.
The wind came howling through the trees again, sending Cherish’s skirt swirling up around her waist. The wind felt cold on her bare thighs. She knocked down her skirt and looked around for Sloan. The lightning came again, followed by thunder. She saw him coming toward her, bending against the wind, carrying another log. He shouted at her, but she couldn’t distinguish the words. He placed the log beside the other one, grabbed his pack and placed it on the logs.
“Sit on it,” he shouted and left her.
Panic clutched her. She called after him: “Come back! Come back!” The words were lost in the roar of the wind.
Her breath came in rasping sobs now. Her hair, loosened by the wind, whipped across her face. Large drops of rain came, pressing her hair to her head and her dress to her shaking body. Thunder rolled and branches snapped off the trees.
She neither saw nor heard Sloan until he was beside her, staggering under the weight of yet another log, which he dropped and kicked up next to the others. Now there was a platform of sorts. Cherish helped him to adjust the packs. He shouted at her, but she could not understand what he was saying. He lifted her and set her down on the logs next to the packs.
The thunder and lightning came together now. The wind tore at her hair and an icy rain began to fall. Sloan sat down beside her and pulled the two blankets around to cover the packs as well as themselves.
“We’re safe here,” he said, adjusting a blanket over their heads. He enveloped her in his arms and pressed her head to his shoulder. With the heavy downpour came a wind that tore at the blankets. Sloan’s back and bowed head were to the wind. The blankets, arranged like a tent, shed the rain that pounded them.
Cherish was aware of the hiss and crackle of lightning as it played in the tops of nearby trees.
“Don’t tremble so. We’re safe here.”
She was surprised to hear his voice so close to her ear. She leaned gratefully against him, her breasts pressed tightly against his chest and her face buried in the hollow of his throat. He held her so tightly, in a protective, sheltering way, that she could feel his heart beating. Her arms encircled him. She liked the feeling of being so close to him. She couldn’t remember being this close to another human being except her mother, and that was so long ago.
She liked the smell of his skin. It smelled like woodsmoke. The whiskers on his chin scraped her cheek. She liked that too. If they had married they could be this close every night. She blushed at the thought.
The storm raged on. Lightning splayed down and struck. Trees split and would have burst into flame, but the deluge of rain quickly extinguished the sparks. The wind tortured the trees, bending them, stripping their limbs and uprooting the weakest among them. Beneath the logs the water puddled, and Cherish understood the reason for keeping the packs off the ground.
It seemed as though hours had passed and still the rain came down. The storm was moving away; the thunder and lightning were less frequent, but the rain continued to fall. Away from the wind, Sloan folded back the edge of the blanket. Grayness crept into the clearing as daylight struggled to establish itself.
Cherish was wonderfully warm. Being small she fit snugly into the arms of the big man holding her. She rested in sweet comfort against him while the rain curtained them and bestowed upon Cherish her first real sense of belonging, enriching her faith in this man with whom fate had joined her in this unpredictable, untamed wilderness.
The fury of the storm finally passed, but the rain continued. Cherish wondered if Sloan’s arms and back were cramped from holding her. She moved her face away from the warmth of his neck and smiled up at him. He smiled back and she forgot the rain hitting the sodden blanket and the puddle of water that surrounded them.
They were a mere breath apart, so close she could see her reflection in the depths of his eyes. She was like a creature mesmerized, her bright hair tumbling about her pale face. His intent gaze moved from her eyes down to the soft parted mouth. Her gaze fastened on the firm lips and she scarcely moved as he breathed words she strained to hear.
“You are beautiful!”
There was controlled power in the way he moved his head. Before she knew what was happening, he brought his lips tasting of rain down upon hers. With a sensual deliberation, his mouth took hers, careful not to crush the feeling from her lips, but to teach them, second by second, to respond and vibrate to the warm caressing movement of his. The feeling became so intense that her entire body pressed with a will of its own to his in sheer delight.
Never before had she been so tremblingly alive. Never in her life had her senses known such excitement. His mouth was an urgent, provoking pressure upon hers, arousing her. She quivered against him, awakened by an overwhelming sensation that she had not known existed.
His mouth left hers reluctantly. He looked at her, eyes glowing, sensuous and beckoning. There was not a whimper of protest in her when he drew her to him again—so close that he hurt her against his hardness—and once again stilled her trembling lips with his. His lips explored hers in desperate search. It was as if he were a man dying of thirst and drinking from a well of cool sweet water. He kissed her until she uttered a little groan, not of fright, but of longing for she knew not what.
Then, just as she was melting into a mindless dream, he shattered it. With two strong hands on her shoulders he put her from him.
“My God!” he said, as if he were being tortured. “You’re so desirable it’s frightening!”
Cherish sat still, dazed, aware of a coldness seeping in where she had been so glowingly warm before. Did he think she had led him on, encouraged his kiss? Was he sorry he had given in to the temptation? With shaking fingers she pulled her shawl up and around her. Sloan turned and looked down at her. He was in control of himself once more, although his eyes were still sultry as they dwelt on her.
“Looks like the rain is about to let up,” he said, as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened between them.
Even as he spoke, Cherish noticed a lessening in the downpour. The rain had definitely eased. She looked out from under the blanket, too full of new radiance within her—and at the same time too disappointed—to speak.
Sloan reached down and touched one of her bare feet tucked und
er her skirt. It was almost numb with cold, but she hadn’t noticed until she felt the warmth of his hand. She fumbled in her lap for the moccasins she had placed there to keep dry. With his large hands Sloan rubbed her cold feet until the warmth returned. Only then did he let her put on the moccasins.
The rain soon splattered into nothing, and the sun broke through. They got to their feet and stood swaying on tortured legs. Cherish pressed the water from the bottom of her skirt while Sloan wrung the water from the dripping blankets. Cherish’s body ached with cold, but the glowing warmth inside her, the wonder she had shared with Sloan if only for a moment, was too precious to allow the misery in her body to dampen her spirits.
The sky after the rain was cloudless, and the sun shone brightly. They stood in front of their campsite and looked at the destruction caused by the storm. Out of a hollow log at the edge of the woods a shaggy brown bundle extracted itself. Brown shook himself vigorously and trotted toward them.
“Look at that!” Sloan laughed. “Snug as a bug. I knew that old boy would find a dry spot for himself.” He reached down and scratched the big head. Brown whined, painfully happy to be united with his master again.
Sloan gave the dog another friendly pat and walked over to where their belongings sat on the logs. The rain had not even dampened the rawhide covering. Everything was dry except for the clothes on their backs and the blankets. Sloan opened the pack and took out her dry dress. He handed it to her and she stepped behind the protruding end of the rock to shed her wet dress and slip on the dry one.
Sloan whipped the wet blankets to remove as much water as possible and spread them on the bushes in the sun. Cherish hung her wet dress on a branch, then shook her hair loose from the braids. She combed it with her fingers and let it hang down her back to dry.
Sloan took the last of the cooked rabbit from his pack and stood regarding it thoughtfully. He handed a piece of it, along with a corn pone, to Cherish.
“Are you hungry enough for this?” he asked.
She accepted the food. “Even this looks good this morning.” She took a bite of the tough meat and chewed slowly.
He watched her, soberly, and started eating his own portion.
“I was going to try to catch us a mess of fish, but the creek is too high. It must have rained a flood up north.”
When they had finished the meal, he sat down to clean the guns, while Cherish turned the blankets, then paced back and forth, letting the sun and the breeze dry her hair.
Several times Sloan stopped what he was doing to watch Brown intently as the dog raised his ears and stared into the dense, still-dripping forest. Sloan’s brown hands moved faster with the work of cleaning the rifle. When he rose to his feet, a remarkable transformation had come over him. His calm relaxed expression had changed to one of fierce alertness.
“Stay here,” he told Cherish. “I want to look around.” He checked the load in the handgun and thrust it into her hands.
Cherish stifled the question that formed on her lips and nodded numbly. In the space of a moment her contentment had changed to dread. Sloan motioned for Brown to stay with her, but it was clear that the dog wanted to go with his master, for he followed him to the edge of the clearing and then stood and waited until Sloan was out of sight.
Returning to Cherish, Brown looked into her face, half-wagging his tail as if apologizing for not wanting to stay with her. Grateful beyond words for the dog’s presence, Cherish put her hand on the shaggy head, and together they waited.
CHAPTER
* 10 *
With flintlock in hand and a knife and a tomahawk in his belt, Sloan pursued a course leading alongside the creek. At intervals he would stop and listen. The sounds of the woods were no mystery to him; they were more familiar than the voices of men.
He turned abruptly from the trail he had been following and plunged down a steep hill. Here he crossed the creek on a large windfall and took to the cover of the willows that grew densely along the bank. Striking a deer trail, he began to run in easy long strides that covered a mile in short order.
Coming to the edge of a rugged bluff, he paused, then veered on down the trail to walk slowly along the edge of the creek that had wound around the hillside. Just as he had expected, he struck the trail of the Indians where they had crossed the water. There were moccasin imprints in the wet sand, some still smooth and intact. They told him the Indians had passed that way since the rain had stopped.
The tracks led along the stream and into the woods. Like a shadow, Sloan passed from tree to tree, from bush to bush; cautiously, but rapidly, he followed the Indians’ tracks. He went on and on. An hour of this found him in the dark backwoods where tangled underbrush, windfalls and gullies blocked his path and made tracking impossible.
Sloan hesitated. He wanted to make certain that the Indians were heading south and would not cross their trail again, but he had gone much farther than he would have liked from the clearing where he had left Cherish. With sudden decision, he turned and retraced his steps, anxious all at once to be back where the girl waited perhaps frightened by his long absence.
* * *
Cherish focused her eyes on the spot where Sloan had disappeared into the forest. Silence closed in around her, as deep and impenetrable and threatening as any she had ever known. Panic stirred in her. Common sense told her that Sloan was an experienced woodsman, unlike her brother, Roy, who had been new to the hazards of the wilderness. He would come back for her, wouldn’t he? Of course he would. She scolded herself for her doubts.
Yet, she was alone in the strange world of towering trees and wild things, and—judging by Sloan’s abrupt departure—some danger yet unknown to her.
A wave of fear washed over her. It was so fierce that her skin began to prickle, her scalp to crawl, her heart to pound, and her breath to quicken. She stood where Sloan had left her, holding the pistol, her eyes alert for any movement, her ears alert for any strange sound.
When Brown came and lay down beside her, a little of her panic drained away, only to rise again each time the dog tilted his head and lifted his ears.
Time passed slowly as Cherish moved from her position beneath the overhang only to turn the blankets in the sun. Her hair dried and she put the pistol down long enough to twist the shining tresses into a long braid. The sun was directly overhead. She would have liked to sit in the warm sunshine and let it bake the stiffness out of her joints and heal the rawness that scratched in her throat, but she was reluctant to leave the shelter of the trees. Still she waited—tense, watchful, fighting growing fear—praying for Sloan’s return.
Such relief flooded over her that she began to tremble when Brown began to whine, wag his tail and dance in place. She knew that Sloan was near. When he entered the clearing, she batted the tears from her eyes.
Sloan motioned for her to stay where she was. And scarcely looking at her, he gathered up the blankets—dry at last—and began assembling their packs.
“Found Indian sign,” he told her simply. “We must move from here.”
Cherish, so wildly happy to have him back with her, only nodded and hurried to help him.
When the packs were ready Sloan squatted down before her and unsheathed his hunting knife. Before she could guess his intentions he had split her skirt, front and back, from mid-thigh to hem.
“We’ll make britches for you so you can move unhampered,” he said before she could voice a protest. He wrapped the sides of the split skirt around her legs and wound a thong from her knee to her ankle to hold it in place.
She mourned the loss of her dress, but the makeshift britches were warm against her legs, and she was surprised when she moved about how comfortable it was to not have her skirt flapping in the wind. Sloan hoisted his pack and the blanket roll to his back. He adjusted her shawl over her shoulders, checking the pistol before he placed it in the sling.
“I figure to make quite a few miles. We’ll have to move fast. Can you do it?”
She nodded, her exp
ression as sober as his. “Don’t worry. I’ll keep up.”
He grinned then, and touched her chin with his fingers.
“All right. Let’s go.” He swung off ahead of her down the slope and into the trees, Brown after him. Without looking back, Cherish followed. She was glad to be traveling again. She kept her eyes on Sloan’s broad back and on Brown trotting at his side. Once, Sloan stopped, wet his finger and held it up to determine from which direction the wind was coming. He frowned.
“Wind’s at our back,” he said, and started off again, stepping up the pace.
Cherish considered the remark as she hurried after him and finally concluded that Sloan thought the danger was ahead and that Brown wouldn’t get the scent because the wind was behind them.
The forest floor was thick with old leaves and sodden with morning rain, and they passed through the woods with scarcely a whisper of sound. Overhead the tall trees met. The sun came through only in scattered patches. Cherish took note of the trees along the creek. She could pick out the ash and the beech, the walnut and the birch and gum. The broadest and the tallest were the oak. They towered over the others, their broad branches discouraging any undergrowth.
Sloan kept to the edge of the creek, making good progress, and Cherish’s spirits rose. She walked lithely, moving easily in her new “britches,” feeling free as air in spite of the strain of constant watchfulness. To breathe the forest smells and to see Sloan and Brown moving ahead of her, safe for now, filled her with quiet joy and crowded fear from her mind.
Sloan didn’t stop until they were well above the place where the Indians had crossed the creek and then only long enough to take his tin cup and some dried meat from his pack. He cut a strip and handed it to Cherish.
“We must keep going,” he told her. “No time to rest. There are at least forty thousand Indians between the Kentucky and the Ohio, and they’re not sitting peacefully in their lodges.”
Cherish bit off a piece of the tough meat and let it soften in her mouth before she tried to chew it. Sloan dipped water from the creek and offered her the cup. She motioned for him to drink first. He drained the cup and refilled it. Cherish had to take the meat from her mouth before she could drink.
Love and Cherish Page 8
