Sequatchie did not answer right away. He stood looking down at the young man and thinking how much he looked like his father. Finally he said, “Only God can help you do that.”
“Do what?”
“Accept your father and love him.”
Jacob pulled his lips together in a straight line and said shortly, “God has never helped me.”
“You sound like your father did at one time.”
Jacob’s head jerked at this. He did not want to be compared with his father, but Sequatchie was looking at him with a peculiar expression. He then said to the young man, “I’ll make a pact with you.”
“A pact? What kind of a pact?”
“I don’t know what you call it in English. If you’ll do something for me, I’ll do something for you.”
Curious, Jacob studied Sequatchie’s face, then said, “All right. Tell me what’s on your mind.”
“If you’ll go back to the frontier with us, I promise to bring you back if you don’t want to stay—after a reasonable time.”
Despite himself Jacob burst out, “A reasonable time? What’s a reasonable time?”
Sequatchie did not answer. Although the boy did not know it, he was praying for this young man. He had learned to pray as he moved through life, and now he was asking God to do a miracle in Jacob’s life. “Think about what I’ve said.”
“Well, all right. I’ll think about it.”
“You’d better do something about that ripped shirt. Don’t know what you can do about that lip.”
“You’re not going to tell?”
“No. Change your shirt.”
Sequatchie left the room and immediately Jacob slipped out of his coat. His shirt was torn right down the front, and he walked over to study himself in the mirror. His lip was somewhat swollen, but perhaps he could get by with it. He slowly picked a light tan shirt off a peg and put it on. He thought about what Sequatchie had said. He buttoned the shirt slowly, thoughtfully, and realized that the last hour had changed his whole life. He knew now, with a dead certainty, that he could never feel for Annabelle what he had thought he had felt before. He was young and had little to do with girls, but he knew that he would be a long time forgetting her words, Who else would I marry but you? He had taken her for a flighty young woman, but now he knew that he had been mistaken. He shoved his shirt down in his pants and then stood uncertainly in the middle of the room.
“I don’t have anything to stay in this place for,” he spoke aloud, and bitterness tinged his voice. A thought began to grow in him, and he had a logical mind that began putting things in order. Maybe that Indian’s right. If I leave with them, I won’t have to say anything to anybody about Annabelle. Then I can come back one day, and by that time she’ll probably be married to Arthur or some other dolt. He moved around the room restlessly, thinking, It doesn’t have anything to do with my father. Deep down he knew this was not altogether true, but he came to stand at the window and the thoughts moved slowly through his mind. I don’t want to go with him, and I’ll never accept him as my father, but I’ll at least get out of here until I get over Annabelle. Somehow he knew that he was not being honest even with himself, for despite all that he had said and thought, there was a longing in him for a father. He buried this, however, and said aloud, “All right. I’ll do it. But it’s just for my own convenience. Not for him!”
****
A sadness lurked in Esther Spencer’s eyes as she served supper. She had heard, of course, about Jacob’s fight with Arthur. That could not be kept secret, and now as Hawk and Sequatchie sat down across from James, she wondered where Jacob was. She had seen him only once that day, and he had said nothing at all about his father.
James was feeling much the same way, and now he said quietly, “Perhaps we ought to try to talk to Jacob again. At least maybe we can convince him to come to you later.”
“No. I don’t think so,” Hawk said quietly. “I believe we ought to leave the boy alone.” He tried to put a good face on it and added, “I know he’s well cared for here. After all, that’s about all I have a right to ask.”
He had no sooner spoken than Jacob entered the room. Hawk saw a strange expression on his son’s face. He sat up straighter and his eyes narrowed as the boy, instead of sitting down, planted his feet and locked his hands behind his back.
“I’ve changed my mind,” Jacob said in a strange tone. He avoided his father’s eyes and instead watched his grandparents. “I’ve decided to go to Watauga for a time.” Shock ran across every face—except that of Sequatchie. A slight smile turned up the corners of his mouth as he watched Hawk, who was staring in disbelief at his son.
“Well, I’m glad to hear that, son,” he said quietly.
Jacob said, “I won’t be with you too long. Just for a while.” Then he turned to his grandmother, as if unwilling to face his father, and said, “Would you help me pack?”
“Of course I will. Come along.”
As soon as the two were out of the room, James said, “Well, miracles do happen.”
“I wonder what changed his mind?” Hawk asked quietly.
Sequatchie never said a word. He sat at the table smiling quietly and thinking about how God could change the hearts of young men.
****
“I’m going to miss you both.”
Now that the hour to leave the only home he knew had actually come, Jacob found it difficult to maintain his composure. All night long he had tossed on his bed, wondering what had possessed him. Several times he had actually made up his mind to go down in the morning and say that he had changed his mind again—that he actually did not want to go to the far valley of the Watauga.
Now, however, he found himself unable to do anything but stand before the two who had played such a large part in his life and struggle not to let the tears appear that burned in his eyes.
“It’s going to be harder on us than it is on you, Jacob,” Esther said. She found it difficult to speak, for her throat was choked with emotion. She and James had talked until long in the night and prayed, hopeful that they were doing the right thing to encourage their young grandson to make such a drastic change in his life. Now that the morning had come and they were faced with the actual separation, it was almost more than she could bear.
James Spencer stepped forward and put his arms out, and Jacob embraced him quickly. He felt the quick strength in the young man’s arms, and also the frustration and doubt that he was feeling. “I couldn’t love you any more and couldn’t be any prouder of you than I am. Just take care of yourself, Jacob.”
Jacob turned to his grandmother, embraced her, kissed her cheek, and then stood awkwardly in the center of the dining room. The remains of the breakfast were on the table, and he had been unable to eat more than a few bites.
“You must go now,” Esther said quickly. “They’re waiting.”
The three made their way outside where Sequatchie and Hawk stood holding the horses. Jacob’s own mount, a rangy old gray mare named Queenie, pranced impatiently, pulling against the bridle that was held firmly in Sequatchie’s hand.
Over to one side Paul and Rhoda stood holding their own horses. They came forward now, and Paul shook hands with the two, while Rhoda was embraced by Esther.
Hawk stood watching all this, keeping his eyes on his son’s face. Finally, before he swung into the saddle, he went forward and embraced his mother, then his father. “I’ll watch him carefully.”
“Take care of yourself, son. And may God keep both of you,” James said.
Hawk moved back to his horse, slipping astride. He turned to Jacob, and the two regarded each other silently. Then Hawk said, “Let’s go home, son.”
He got no answer, for Jacob’s throat was too full to speak. As the small procession moved away from the Spencer house, Jacob turned back for a last look at the only home he had ever known. He waved at his grandparents and saw that his grandmother was being held tightly by his grandfather, as if she were too weak to stand. He turned his
head away, unable to watch it more, and then the five clattered down the streets of Williamsburg, heading for the wilderness that lay across the misty mountains.
Chapter Seven
The New Family
“Are you getting pretty tired, Jacob?”
Shifting back and forth in his saddle, Jacob turned quickly to see that Rhoda had pulled her mare up even with his own. She was smiling at him, and he took in the clean sweep of her chin and the brilliance of her eyes, thinking, not for the first time, that she was very attractive for an older woman. He had expected to find a woman of thirty-six rather dowdy and had been slightly shocked by her attractiveness—and also by the liveliness of her mind. He had heard something of her past from his grandparents and from common gossip in the community, but looking at her now, as the afternoon sun filtered through the towering chestnuts and beeches overhead, he decided he liked her.
“I’m all right,” he said. He hesitated for a moment, then said, “I’m not used to riding this long at a time.”
“I know. It makes you numb, doesn’t it?”
Jacob grinned at her and said, “I wish I was numb. It wouldn’t hurt so much, then.”
The small party had been two and a half weeks out of Williamsburg. Jacob didn’t realize that Hawk and Sequatchie had deliberately slowed the pace, knowing that Jacob would not be able to keep it up without showing the strain. All in all it had been a rather pleasant journey. The fall colors were fading now, but still the air was fresh and crisp with the ending of the season. Winter lurked over the low-lying hills ahead of them, and both Hawk and Sequatchie knew that in one night the cold breath could descend, paralyzing the land and freezing the grass into a crisp brown ash.
The days had been exciting for Jacob. He had somehow put behind him the apprehension that arose at the difficult adjustment he would have to make on the frontier. He found himself talking more and listening with fascination as Sequatchie would speak of the legends of his people at night around the campfire. Jacob had a faulty concept of what Indians were like. Instead, he saw quickly that Sequatchie’s mind was quicker than his own. Though the tall Cherokee was uneducated in books, he knew every tree and animal, what the weather would be the next day, and how to find water. All the things that a lifetime of experience had taught him were there for Jacob to see. He listened avidly as Sequatchie told the history of his people and once said, “You ought to put this all down in a book so it won’t be lost.”
“It will not be lost. We do not have books—not yet,” Sequatchie said, “but it is all in the stories of my people. They are told around campfires and will be as long as the wind blows and the waters flow.”
Paul had also watched Jacob Spencer carefully. He had some apprehensions, for he knew the bitterness that lurked below the surface of the young man’s polite manners. Of all the men he knew, Hawk Spencer was the one he admired most, and it was imperative to Paul that he do all he could to help restore the relationship between the two. He had not spoken of this to Hawk, for the two men understood each other. However, one night as he slept beneath warm blankets with the campfire crackling, he asked, “What do you think of Jacob, Rhoda?”
Rhoda moved against him, holding him tightly. “I think he’s a very troubled young man, Paul. He speaks so stiffly to his father.”
“Yes,” Paul whispered. The wood crackling in the fire punctuated the silence of the night, and overhead a ghostly form crossed the skies, blotting out the moon for a second, a great hunting owl out for his prey. Paul watched it as it disappeared, then put his lips on Rhoda’s smooth cheek. He had not gotten over the marvel yet of the love that had come to him, and now forgetting the conversation, he whispered, “I love you, Rhoda.”
“I love you, too, Paul.”
****
“Well, there it is. There’s Watauga, son.”
Jacob looked up quickly, taking in the small collection of rough cabins that followed the bend of a creek. There seemed to be no pattern in the town, and he was somehow troubled by what he saw. His concept of a town was Williamsburg, all laid off in neat, geometrical streets, each house taking a certain amount of space, and each street intersected by others with different names.
What lay before him was nothing like that. Smoke curled up in a haphazard, twisting fashion from almost all of the chimneys, and between the cabins only a few figures could be seen moving. Somehow the picture in his mind had been of a well-organized village. Watauga was nothing but a scattering of rude cabins punctuated with small out-buildings, all very roughly built.
“It doesn’t look much like Williamsburg, does it?” Hawk said wryly, noting the look of surprise on Jacob’s face.
“It’s so small!”
“The biggest settlement this side of the mountains,” Sequatchie said. “Look, there’s our welcoming committee.”
As the procession wound its way around a crooked trail into the village, two men advanced to meet them.
As soon as they were close enough, Hawk said, “Hello, William. How are you, James?”
William Bean and James Robertson stopped, and Robertson smiled slyly, saying, “Welcome back, Reverend—and you, too, Mrs. Anderson. I want to wish you a happy marriage. Wish I could have been at the wedding.”
William, with his wife Lydia, had established the settlement. He and Robertson were two of its prominent leaders.
Rhoda had wondered how she would be accepted as the wife of a minister, but the teasing smile in the eyes of Robertson gave her reassurance. She returned the smile, then listened as Hawk introduced his son to the two men. She was thinking, I wonder if the women will be as kind as the men. They usually aren’t. She thought, however, that she knew the women of the Watauga settlement, and a glance at her new husband gave her a sudden sense of joy and acceptance. It will be all right, she thought, as long as I have Paul.
“What’s been happening since we’ve been gone?” Hawk asked, slipping off his horse. He slapped the animal on the neck and listened as William Bean spoke. He noted a rather worried look in Bean’s eyes.
“Well, Hawk, there’s a man come here named Alexander Cameron. You know of him?”
“Can’t say as I’ve heard of him.”
“He claims to represent John Stuart, the Indian superintendent for the south.”
“I know Stuart. He is a good man,” Hawk replied. His mind suddenly flashed backward to the time when he had been with John Stuart. Stuart had been the British captain who had led the force to recapture Fort Loudon. For just one moment he seemed to hear the explosion of muskets and the screams of the dying and the wounded. Hawk had this strange characteristic of re-creating involuntarily scenes from his past, so that now it seemed as though he could smell the burning gunpowder and feel the slippery body of the Indian under his as they struggled for life. All these came back to him in a flashing, dynamic moment. Shaking his head slightly, he listened carefully as Bean continued.
“They’ve been surveying the whole area, Hawk.”
“What are they doing that for? It’s already been done.”
James Robertson spoke up almost angrily. “They say there’s some kind of discrepancy as to who has the rights to the land settlements. We told him the settlements are on the land that was promised, and what remained was for the Cherokee.”
“Stuart negotiated a treaty with the Cherokee after they were defeated in 1761,” Hawk said. “What are the settlers doing?”
“Nothing much. Waiting to hear from the results of this survey. It’s called a Donelson Survey. I guess that’s the name of the fellow who’s drawing it up.”
Hawk and Paul listened closely, well aware that this could mean serious changes in all of their lives. If the government decided that the former survey was wrong, all the work they had done on their homesteads could be lost.
Hawk shook his head, saying, “I’ve got to get home. We’ll talk about this later.”
“Come along, Rhoda,” Paul said. “It’s time for us to set up housekeeping.”
Rhoda
smiled as he drew his horse around, and she followed him.
“We fixed their cabin up for them real nice while the preacher was gone to get married, Hawk,” Bean said. “The women cleaned it up, and we’ve got plenty of meat in the smokehouse. I wish they’d stay there permanently and start a church here.”
“They won’t do that,” Hawk said firmly. “They’ll stay there this winter, but in the spring they’ll go to the Cherokee, preaching the gospel to them. Isn’t that right, Sequatchie?”
“Yes. My people must hear the Word of God. I’ll spend winter in Hawk’s old cabin, and I will go with them in the spring.” His eyes followed the couple as they left, and he was thinking, with joy, what it would be like to have a minister among his people who so desperately needed the living God in their midst.
****
Andrew MacNeal was splitting red oak firewood as the sun sank down behind the low-lying western hills. It was a chore he liked a great deal for some reason. Sawing the trees off into lengths with a buck saw was not as enjoyable. That was pure work, but now he planted his feet firmly, lifted the heavy ax, and, after measuring the distance to the chunk of wood before him, brought the ax down smartly. The blade struck the upright wood with a chunking sound, and the two fell splinterless like two pieces of cloven rock. This gave Andrew a great deal of satisfaction. Reaching over to pick up another chunk, he began to sing under his breath a snatch of a song he had heard at one of the rare dances held in the settlement. His blond hair fell over his forehead, and he brushed it back, then split another block of wood. As the two pieces leaped to the side, he heard a voice and turned quickly with an alertness that had not been there. Automatically he moved toward his left, reaching for the musket that was leaning up against a sapling, his clear blue eyes attentive and watchful. Then he saw the two tall men exiting from the patch of woods on the east of the farm and cried out, “Hawk!” Dropping the ax, he stepped forward, his face alive with pleasure as he waited. He took in the third rider and thought, That’s got to be Jacob. Ma said that Hawk might bring him back to live with us.
Beyond the Quiet Hills Page 8
