Sweet Mountain Magic

by Rosanne Bittner

  “Mary, talk to me.” He leaned down and kissed her forehead. “I love you, Mary. Remember how we promised, no matter what, we’d still love each other? I feel just the same as I always did, only I think I love you even more.”

  She only lay with her eyes closed, her breathing shallow. She’d been through so much. Surely her mind and body could take no more. The thought of her dying up here on this mountain, of having to bury his Mary here in the middle of winter—it all filled him with overwhelming grief. He had lived his whole life without her, yet now the thought of losing her seemed unbearable.

  He had always been alone, but never lonely. Now he would understand how it felt to be truly alone, and he didn’t like the feeling. This woman had brought out emotions he never knew he had, made him understand needs that had never been awakened before in his soul. She had brought him a new kind of strength, and had added a sense of direction to his life.

  Now it all seemed to be slipping away. He had been so happy to know she was pregnant. And in such a brief moment he had lost it all. He had known the memory was bound to return, but he hadn’t expected this—such a violent reaction, and the loss of the baby. He had hoped all along the baby would come before she remembered. He had been certain that once she held it and nursed it, she would know it belonged to Sage.

  He checked her bleeding again and felt panic when he saw the blood-soaked towel he had packed under her. He quickly removed it, putting a clean one under her and washing out the bloody one in a bucket. He couldn’t possibly get out all the blood, but he would need the towel. Even though it was pink rather than white, he hung it over a log near the fireplace so it would dry out quickly, for he would have to use it again. He had no alternative. There simply were not enough towels and rags to keep up with the bleeding.

  He glanced at the little bundle on the table, tied into the rawhide. It would be best to bury it right away, but he didn’t want to leave Mary more often than necessary. Soon he would have to go for fresh water to wash the towels. He would do it then.

  He turned and threw more wood into the fireplace. He would have to keep it as warm as possible in the cabin. He knew from experience that someone who had lost a lot of blood was usually very thirsty. He dipped some water out of the drinking bucket and took it over to her, kneeling down beside her and cradling her head in his arm.

  “Drink some of this water, Mary,” he told her. He put the ladle to her lips. “Come on. Do it for Sage.”

  Her lips parted slightly and he managed to dribble some down her throat. He was relieved that at least it seemed she was acknowledging his love by taking the drink because he had asked her. But then again perhaps it had been only a natural human reaction. “It was just the water, not you,” he muttered to himself.

  He laid her back, setting the ladle aside. “Mary? Tell me how you feel, honey. Talk to Sage. I don’t know what to do for you, Mary. You’ve got to help me.”

  “Die,” she whispered weakly, not even opening her eyes. “Let…me…die, Sage.”

  “No way.” He leaned closer. At least she could hear him and was comprehending what he was saying. He had to take advantage of the moment. “Sage MacKenzie isn’t letting his woman die, you hear, Mary? And you are still my woman. Nothing that’s happened to you can change that. I suspected it all along, and I love you anyway. Nothing has changed for me. Things can only change if you let them, Mary. We’re still the same people, and I still love you, you hear? I still love you and I need you. Don’t leave me all alone, Mary. I could stand it before, because I didn’t have you. But now that I’ve been with you, fallen in love with you, had you with me, I don’t want to be alone again—ever. I want you with me.”

  “Too many…no good,” she groaned.

  “Oh yes, you are. You’re a damned good woman, Mary. There isn’t one thing that happened that was your fault. You’re a good, good woman, and beautiful and intelligent. You’re gonna live, and we’re gonna talk about all of this and get it all straight. We’ll be together. Come spring we’ll get married, just like we planned, and we’ll have more babies.”

  “Baby,” she squeaked. “My…baby. They…killed her.” Her chest jerked in a heaving sob and he bent close, drawing her up to hold her tightly so that her face rested in his neck.

  “Hush, Mary. That’s all over. Your baby is happy now—running and playing in some pretty, warm, sunny place where she’ll never be cold or hungry, and where there’re lots of other little ones who’ve left this life. She’s probably playing with her daddy right now, both of them happy and free.”

  She made a sorrowful keening sound and he kissed her hair. “Shh. Hush, Mary. You’re strong, much stronger than you realize. You’ll make it through all this, just like you survived the Indians and the way you were treated. Why, you’re the bravest woman I ever knew, and that includes all the Indian women. Now all you’ve got to do is lie real still till the bleeding stops, and let Sage feed you and take care of you till you’re nice and strong again. We’ll talk. We’ll talk and talk and get it all out of you. And then we’ll decide what to do next. One day at a time, Mary. Remember? We agreed to one day at a time.”

  “Don’t care…anymore. Nothing left…nothing.”

  “There’s me. There’s Sage MacKenzie. Were you just lying when you said you loved me? Don’t you care about Sage, about his being alone, about how much he loves and needs you?”

  “Different…now,” she whimpered.

  “No. It’s no different—no different at all. You’re still my beautiful Mary, and I still love you. And I’ll tell you something else, Mary. That baby was mine you lost. It was Sage MacKenzie’s, you hear? I know it right in my bones. Nobody can tell me any different. And you’d by-God better believe it, too, because I’m sure of it in my heart.”

  “Can’t…know…”

  “Sure I can. God has a way of making a person know. That baby is mine, Mary, and I saved our little piece of life. I’m going to bury him or her, and come spring we’ll put a nice marker on the grave.”

  She made no reply. He laid her back, checking the bleeding again. It seemed to be slowing. He wished he knew more about woman things and realized for the first time just how far removed he had been from civilization. He had known nothing but other mountain men, loose women, bears and beaver, and how to survive a Rocky Mountain winter. He didn’t know much about how fine people like Mary lived.

  At the moment he also realized how little he knew about how a woman’s insides worked. He knew how to make love to these strange creatures, how to take his pleasure with them. But what happened inside them after the seed was planted, that was a mystery to him. Where did all the blood come from? What was happening when a woman had her time? All he knew was that if she didn’t have it, she was probably pregnant. And he knew how pleasurable it was getting her that way. Mary had made it so special, for never before had he known the ecstasy of being one with a woman he truly loved. That had made it all the more wonderful and exciting.

  But loving someone could take a heavy toll on a man’s heart. This was costing him in a way he had never paid before.

  “You lie real still, understand?” he told her. “I’ve got to bury the baby, and I’m going for more water. I don’t want you to move one inch before I get back.”

  She made no reply. He didn’t want to leave her, but he had no choice. He rose, pulling on his winter moccasins and the sheepskin coat Sax had brought for him. He picked up the bucket of bloody water and carried it to the door, unlatching it and going outside to dump the water. He came back in and got a spade from his supplies in the corner of the room.

  He carefully picked up the little bundle that held the bit of life so small he couldn’t even tell if it was a boy or girl. He went out again, walking along the “hallway” he had dug to the outhouse, following it farther to the stream. There was nowhere else a man could walk right now, and the horses were long gone. He hoped they had reached safety and were grazing somewhere rather than lying frozen under all this snow.
/>   At the stream, which miraculously still flowed free in some spots, he set down the bucket and carefully laid the lifeless little bundle inside while he dug away a little more snow at the side of the tunnel-like pathway. It took all his strength to get the spade into the ground and dig down enough so that the soil became looser. But even then, it was difficult digging, for the ground was mostly rock. He forced the spade until his shoulders screamed with pain. But he didn’t care how hard it was to dig. He would not let the wolves get to his child. He would bury him or her plenty deep.

  Finally the hole seemed wide and deep enough. The little bundle would not take a lot of room. He was glad he had no adult body to bury, but the thought gave him a sudden chill of horror. Would he be doing this for Mary’s body a few hours from now? How could he possibly stand and dig a grave for his Mary? How could he possibly put her into the cold, cruel ground and leave her lying up here alone forever? It was bad enough having to do it with the nameless child.

  To his own surprise, his eyes filled with tears as he took the little bundle then and carefully placed it into the hole. He stared at it, then felt all the strain of the last few hours move through him in one swift, painful ripple that made him cry openly. Until Mary had come along, he had never been a man to feel all these emotions, nor a man to weep over anything. The last time he had cried before meeting Mary had been the day his parents were killed in the fire. After that a kind of armor had grown around him, an invisible shield to hurt. Somehow Mary had broken that shield, and grief overwhelmed him.

  He finally regained control of himself, but wondered how he could bury the helpless little life before him. They would probably leave this place in the spring and never come back. Either Mary’s way of living would compel them to live in civilization, or circumstances would force them to part. If that happened, he could never return to this cabin where he had known so much love and happiness, and where his life had changed so drastically. Either way, they would not come back, and this little baby would lie alone here on this mountain forever.

  But that was the way life went in these mountains. The peaks and valleys cried out with the souls of lost loved ones. The Indians knew that feeling, had left many of their sons and daughters, husbands and wives, fathers and mothers, lying on scaffolds and facing the heavens. How many times had he come upon a sacred burial ground? Death was merely a continuation of life. That’s the way the Indians saw it. Everyone was born to die, and the revolution of life and death was a ongoing fact of nature.

  Sage had accepted all that all his life, until the thought of Mary dying had hit him. This little child was a part of himself and Mary, and now it would lie here near the cabin, a piece of themselves they would leave behind to mark this place where they had fallen in love and had shared so much of each other.

  “Lord, if you listen to men like me, take this little baby and give him or her a nice place up there, where it’s warm and beautiful. And Lord, help me know what to do…” His voice had become choked and he sniffed and swallowed. “Help me know what to do…with Mary. Don’t let her die, God. I’ve got nothing left if she dies.”

  He cleared his throat, taking a deep breath for courage and then scooping the cold dirt into the hole. “Damn,” he muttered as he wept, watching the little bundle disappear. He worked fast then, just wanting to finish it. His tears froze on his cheeks as he worked, and his hands felt numb. He searched around under the snow for a rock that was particularly different, something he could use as a marker until spring. He found a jagged-edged rock with a lot of red in it. It was not smooth like the others. He laid it on top of the freshly dug grave, taking a good look at it so he would remember it.

  He forced himself to turn away then, dipping the bucket into the icy water and rinsing it, then filling it. He picked it up, along with the spade, and headed back to the cabin. He did not look back. He could only hope a lot of fresh snow would fall before he returned, covering up his digging and footprints. That would make it easier when he came back for more water. He wished he could have buried the baby someplace a little farther away, but with so much snow, he had little choice.

  He had to stop thinking about it. He had to concentrate now on Mary. He had to make her want to live, and then there was the matter of where she had come from. Everything was going to change, and it made his heart heavy.

  Sage awoke to a small but direct beam of sunlight that shot through the little window of the cabin. In his sleepy state its brightness and warmth reminded him of spring, and he could almost hear birds singing. But then he sat bolt upright, realizing that sometime during the night he had finally dozed off from the emotional exhaustion of his ordeal with Mary.

  He rubbed his eyes, leaning over her and putting fingers on her throat to feel for a pulse. He had done all he could the night before, cleaning her up and repacking her, falling asleep with a prayer on his lips that she would not die. He felt her pulse, which seemed stronger, and her violet eyes fluttered open for a moment, then closed again.

  “Thirsty,” she whispered.

  Sage breathed a sigh of relief that she was alive. He quickly checked and found that the bleeding was not nearly as bad as it had been hours earlier. “I’ll get you some water,” he told her, getting up and going to dip some out for her. He came back and held the ladle to her lips, supporting her head for her. She sipped some of the water, then looked up at him with the beautiful eyes he had learned to love. Now they were sunken, and full of sorrow.

  “I lost it, didn’t I?”

  He nodded, setting the ladle aside and moving his legs under her so he could cradle her head in his lap. “I heard an old Indian woman say once that losing a baby is just nature’s way of sparing the mother heartache—that there was probably something wrong with the baby.”

  She closed her eyes and swallowed back a lump in her throat. “There was. It was the seed of one of those evil men.”

  “No. You can believe that all you want, Mary, but I know better. I touched it and I know it was mine, and I’ll never believe otherwise. That’s a piece of us buried out there, and he or she will always be a reminder of our love up here in this cabin.”

  His voice became choked, and she couldn’t bear to look at him, couldn’t bear his own suffering. Now that she knew all of it, how could they stay together? All of the wonderful joy and love they had found together was ruined.

  “I must be…quite a disappointment,” she said, her voice a near whisper. “Losing your baby…used by all those…men.”

  He pressed his hands to each side of her face. “You listen to me, Mary. I love you—same as I did before, maybe more. I had a pretty good idea of what you had been through before you remembered any of it, and I didn’t care. As far as the baby, it’s like I said. There was probably something wrong. It was for the best. Now we’ve got to go on with living, and we’ve got to talk about what we’re gonna do now. But first you rest, three, four days—however long it takes for you to feel stronger. I don’t want you running any of it through your mind before then. I just want you to lie here and sleep.” He smoothed her hair. “You bled bad last night. I thought it wouldn’t stop in time. But it’s better now. You just lie here and I’ll feed you and all and you’ll be stronger in no time. Then we’ll talk. Then we’ll decide what to do.”

  “Nothing…to decide. I should have died…not last night, but…before. The Comanche…should have killed me. It would have been…better.”

  “No. Anything is better than giving up and dying, Mary.”

  “I can…never be the same…never…never…without my baby. Without my…little girl…and Rafe…”

  She began to cry quietly.

  “What about me?” Sage asked then, leaning down and kissing her cheek. “What about me, Mary? I’m here and I love you. None of it matters to me. Don’t I count anymore? Just because you remember your past, does that mean you have to forget all about Sage MacKenzie? I still love you and I want to marry you. Nothing has changed for me. We promised each other we’d always lov
e each other, no matter what you remembered. You going back on your promise, Mary?”

  She lifted a thin hand to her face. “I don’t know,” she whimpered. “I…can’t think, Sage.”

  “You don’t have to think. Like I told you, all you have to do for now is lie here and get well. Then you can think. Nothing makes much sense when you’re so weak you can hardly raise your arms. We have to do one thing at a time, and the first thing is to get you well.”

  She lay there crying. He didn’t know that some of her tears were from sheer gratitude that he was there and he still loved her. Everything had been so beautiful—their love, the baby, their private little hideaway in the mountains.

  Now the baby was gone, and she had remembered the two horrible men it could have belonged to. Sage had lived with that hellish secret, keeping it to himself just so she wouldn’t be hurt. And now she knew there had been another man—Rafe. Rafe Cousteau. It wouldn’t have been so bad if it had just been her husband and the two men from the fort. But the Comanche. The Comanche! So many of them. And then that filthy whiskey trader. And what about after that? What about the times she still couldn’t remember?

  Her crying had turned into deep, bitter sobs. Sage leaned over and held her close. “Try not to cry, Mary. Everything is gonna be all right. I’m here and I’m staying—and I love you. You’re gonna get well, for me, because you know I wouldn’t want to go on living without my Mary. You’ve come into my life now, Mary. It would be pretty mean of you to go out of it just when I know more than ever how much I love you.”

  “Not just…yours…”

  “Yes, you are. In your heart you’re just mine. And it’s the same in my own heart. A woman belongs to whoever owns her heart, Mary, not her body. I own your heart now. Your Sage MacKenzie’s woman, and nothing that has happened will change that.”

  She looked up at him through tears. “How can you…still love me?”

  He smiled sadly. “Because you’re my Mary. You couldn’t help any of it, Mary. What kind of love is it when a man loves only under certain conditions? You either love somebody, or you don’t. You don’t stop loving because of things that can’t be helped.”